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THE    MASQUE    OF    DEATH 

AND  OTHER  POEMS. 


A  thread  of  song,  a  fragmentary  strain, 
A  few  frail  links  of  half  familiar  rhyme, 

Throb  on  the  night,  then  fall  and  die  again, 
Leaving  no  echo  in  the  lapse  of  time  ; 

But  if  some  wayfarer  should  linger,  fain 
To  catch  once  more  the  interrupted  chime, 

Why,  then,  this  music  was  not  made  in  vain. 


THE  MASQUE  OF  DEATH 


AND   OTHER    POEMS 


BY 

CHARLES  LOTIN  HILDRETH 

it 

AUTHOR  OF 

44  JUDITH,"  "  Oo,"  " THE  NEW  SYMPHONY,"  ETC. 


CHICAGO,  NEW  YORK  &  SAN  FRANCISCO  : 

BELFORD,    CLARKE    &    COMPANY, 
PUBLISHERS. 


COPYRIGHT    1889,   BY 

BELFORD,  CLARKE  &  COMPANY. 


PREFACE. 


IT  is  with  a  regretful  sense  of  a  broken  flight,  a  race 
half  run,  a  song  silenced  in  the  midst,  that  I  look  upon 
these  my  collected  verses,  wrought,  for  the  most  part, 
in  the  brief  and  infrequent  intervals  of  uncongenial  and 
imperative  labors.  I  feel  that  they  constantly  bear  the 
impress  of  the  weariness  and  depression  which  they 
were  intended,  in  some  measure  at  least,  to  relieve. 
This  is  not  said  by  way  of  excuse  for  their  shortcom- 
ings, which  I  perceive,  perhaps  more  clearly  than  an- 
other can.  To  offer  one's  productions  to  criticism,  and 
then  deprecate  it,  is  an  affectation  which  I  shall  not  be 
guilty  of.  But  I  shall  be  grateful  if,  with  the  percep- 
tion of  their  faults,  shall  be  united  some  appreciation 
of  the  endeavor  which  called  them  into  being.  That, 
I  know,  has  a  value  and  a  worth  of  its  own.  If  it  win 
for  me  some  degree  of  kindly  recognition  among 
thoughtful  readers,  my  hopes  will  be  more  than  ful- 
filled. 

NEW  YORK,  December,  1888. 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE. 

The  Masque  of  Death 9 

Ghosts 12 

Love 15 

To  an  Obscure  Poet 16 

Joy 19 

Time 20 

The  Owl 21 

The  Chimes 23 

The  Wood  Thrush 25 

Midnight 26 

The  Tryst 29 

Sea  Fancies 30 

The  Spirit  of  Poetry 32 

He  Needs  no  Tears 35 

Ambition 36 

The  Prophecy 37 

Chime  Pictures 39 

Clearing  Weather 41 

Moonrise 42 

Nature 45 

History 46 

Mithra 47 

Song— The  Vigil 49 

The  Hour 50 

Implora  Pace 52 


PAGE. 

Evening 53 

Song — Regret 54 

The  Lotus  Flower 55 

Romance ,....  57 

The  Awakening 58 

Song — While  Love  is  New . .  59 

The  Burden  of  Time 60 

Song — Could  I  Love  Thee  so 

Well 63 

The  King  and  the  Poet, ....  65 

Winter — A  Lament. ,,,,.,..  66 

Nocturne 68 

Fame 70 

Music 71 

A  Winter  Evening , .  73 

Doubt 75 

Frost 77 

Lament  ....,,., 79 

Knowledge 80 

Carlyle Si 

Hero  Worship 84 

December — An  Elegy 86 

Song— 88 

Love's  Language 89 

The  Appeal 90 


CONTENTS. 


PAGE. 

Recompense 91 

Contrasts 93 

To  an  Eagle 94 

Toil 96 

Snow  Sorcery 97 

To  a  Wandering  Dog 99 

At  Dawn 100 

Ice  Bound 101 

Illusion 1 02 

Invocation 103 

Over  the  Mountains 104 

Mutability 107 

Wronged  Love 108 

Random  Chords — 

A  Vista 109 

Dawn  Music 109 

Night  Silence UQ 

Gloaming no 

Pursuit no 

Winter  Beauty in 

Solitude in 

Revisited 112* 

Renaissance 113 

Song — How  Many  Lips 115 

Love's  Dwelling-Plaee 1 16 

In  Captivity 119 

At  the  Mermaid  Inn 121 


PAGE. 

The  Song  of  the  Scythe 123 

June  Days 125 

Memory 127 

To  a  Butterfly 128 

At  Sunrise 129 

Italian  Dreams 130 

The  Flower  of  Love 132 

Truth 133 

The  Heir 136 

Fireside  Song , . . . .   138 

The  Face  of  Love 139 

Perennial  Beauty 141 

The  Sisters 142 

The  Holy  Hour 144 

Love's  Faith 146 

Among  the  Mountains 148 

Earth-Bound 149 

The  Irony  of  Time 151 

The  Parting  of  Summer 153 

Metempsychosis 154 

Duet 156 

Insincerity 157 

Bitter-Sweet 160 

The  Eldorado 162 

The  King 164 

Cloudland..  167 


THE  MASQUE  OF  DEATH, 

AND  OTHER  POEMS. 

THE  MASQUE  OF  DEATH. 

A  FUNERAL  passed  me  in  the  street  to-day — 
A  dolorous  procession  moving  slow 

With  all  the  grim  respectable  display 

Which  makes  a  hideous  mockery  of  woe. 

Ah,  but  'twas  brave  !     A  spectacle  so  fine 
Might  almost  tempt  an  humble  wight  to  die, 

For  once  in  proud  pre-eminence  to  shine 
Chief  actor  in  a  grisly  tragedy. 

In  truth  I  turned  away  in  sick  disgust 

With  all  the  proud  parade  of  plume  and  pall, 

And  some  small  pity  for  the  senseless  dust 
Consigned  to  earth  with  ghastly  festival. 


10  THE  MASQUE  OF  DEATH. 

The  savage  past  still  clings  to  us,  we  deem 

It  sacred  duty  to  display  our  woe 
In  ostentatious  mummery,  and  dream 

The  dead  are  honored  by  the  dreadful  show. 

The  grave  is  very  humble,  and  the  pride 
That  fools  us  here  the  dead  have  all  forgot  ; 

The  king  and  slave  lie  calmly  side  by  side, 
Each  well  contented  with  his  lowly  lot. 

Impartial  earth  receives  into  her  breast 

The  varied  brood  she  bears,  the  great  and  small, 

High-thoughted  man  and  stolid  brute,  the  best 
And  worst  unfavored,  for  she  loves  them  all. 

But  man,  too  conscious  of  himself,  resents 
The  pure  democracy  of  Nature's  plan, 

And  rears  above  his  bones  brief  monuments 
To  bear  the  empty  tale  :  Here  lies  a  Man  ! 

Years  wear  serenely  on,  another  age 

Treads  laughing  on  the  sorrows  of  the  last, 

Time  wears  the  letters  from  the  granite  page, 
And  weeds  grow  on  the  memories  of  the  past 


THE  MASQUE  OF  DEATH .     • 

And  rightly  viewed,  it  is  a  gracious  doom  ; 

The  dead  and  their  traditions  pass  away 
To  give  new  life,  new  thought,  new  beauty  room, 

A  higher  law  of  being  to  obey. 


12 


GHOSTS. 


GHOSTS. 

TWELVE  by  the  chime  :  from  idle  dreams  awaking, 
I  trim  my  lamp  and  mount  the  creaking  stair ; 

The  shadows  through  the  carven  arches  shaking 
Seem  mocking  phantoms  that  pursue  me  there. 

The  faded  portraits  in  the  lamp-light's  glamour 
Look  down  with  cold  inquisitorial  gaze  ; 

The  sculptured  busts,  the  knights  in  rusted  armor, 
Loom  large  against  the  window's  pictured  maze. 

Thick  dust  falls  from  the  time-worn,  tattered  hangings, 

Thick  dust  lies  on  the  tessellated  floor  ; 
My  step  sounds  loud,  the  door's  sepulchral  clangings 

Roll  far  along  the  gusty  corridor. 

Ah  me  !  amid  my  dwelling's  desolation 
It  seems  some  fable  that  my  brain  recalls, 

That  once  a  glad  and  gallant  generation 

Loved,  laughed,  and  feasted  in  these  lonely  halls. 


GHOSTS.  13 

Silent  the  voice  of  song,  and  hushed  the  laughter, 
Cheerless  and  cold  the  empty  banquet-room  ; 

The  spider  weaves  in  gilded  groin  and  rafter, 

The  shrill  wind  whistles  through  the  vaulted  gloom. 

Vanished  those  dear  ones,  by  what  hidden  highways, 
In  what  far  regions,  o'er  what  stormy  waves, 

I  know  not,  nor  in  what  oblivious  byways 

The  sere  grass  sighs  above  their  nameless  graves. 

And  yet,  as  if  my  soul's  imperious  longing 

Were  as  a  spell  unspoken  yet  supreme,  [ing, 

Pale  shapes  seem  through  the  hollow  darkness  throng- 
Like  those  wan  visitants  which  haunt  a  dream. 

They  gather  round  me  through  the  silent  spaces, 
Like  clouds  across  the  waning  twilight  blown, 

Till  all  the  room  is  filled  with  flickering  faces 

And  hovering  hands  that  reach  to  wring  my  own. 

With  friendly  greeting  and  familiar  gesture, 
Wearing  the  form  and  feature  that  they  wore 

When  youth  and  beauty  clothed  them  like  a  vesture, 
They  come,  the  unforgotten  ones  of  yore. 


I4  GHOSTS. 

On  cheek  and  brow  I  feel  their  chill  caresses, 
Like  cold,  faint  airs  of  autumns  long  ago  ; 

I  hear  the  sighing  of  their  ghostly  tresses, 
The  trailing  of  their  garments  to  and  fro. 

Up  from  the  gulfs  of  time,  the  blind  abysses, 
Those  radiant  phantoms  of  the  past  arise, 

And  bring  again  the  perfume  of  their  kisses, 
The  peril  and  the  splendor  of  their  eyes. 

But  cold  their  lips,  they  breathe  no  warm  affection, 
And  cold  their  breasts  as  frozen  shapes  of  snow  ; 

Their  luminous  eyes  are  but  a  vague  reflection; 
Stray  starbeams  in  the  ice-bound  stream  below. 

Tis  well  :  nay,  if  by  spell  or  incantation 
The  loved  and  lost  I  might  again  behold, 

Breathing  and  warm  in  youth's  bright  incarnation, 
And  glowing  with  the  loveliness  of  old. — 

That  word  I  would  withhold,  for  their  sakes  only  : 
Estranged  and  changed  as  in  a  haggard  dream, 

Time-tossed  and  tempest-beaten,  old  and  lonely, 
To  their  young  eyes  what  spectres  we  should  seem  ! 


LOVE. 


LOVE. 

LOVE  was  primeval ;  from  forgotten  time 

Come  hints  of  common  lives  by  love  made  great, 
In  pastoral  song  or  fragmentary  rhyme, 

While  fades  the  fame  of  many  a  warlike  state. 
Love  lives  forever,  though  we  pass  away  ; 

Still  shall  there  be  hot  hearts  and  longing  eyes, 
Hyperion  youths  and  maids  more  fair  than  they, 

Loath  lips  and  lingering  hands  and  parting  sighs, 
When  we  have  vanished  and  our  simple  doom 

Is  blended  with  the  themes  of  old  romance. 
Ay,  from  our  dust  young  buds  and  flowers  shall  bloom, 

To  deck  bright  tresses  in  the  spring-tide  dance 
And  be  the  mute,  sweet  signs  of  love  confessed 
To  passioned  hopes  upon  a  maiden's  breast. 


TO  AN  OBSCURE  POET. 


TO  AN  OBSCURE  POET  WHO  LIVES  ON  MY 
HEARTH. 

WHY  shouldst  thou  cease  thy  plaintive  song 

When  I  draw  near  ? 
Has  mankind  done  thee  any  wrong, 

That  thou  shouldst  fear  ? 

To  see  thee  scampering  to  thy  den, 

So  wild  and  shy, 
Twould  seem  thou  knowst  the  ways  of  men 

As  well  as  I. 

'Tis  true  the  palmy  days  are  o'er 

When  all  thy  kind — 
Poor  minstrel  folk — at  every  door 

Might  welcome  find  ; 

For  song  was  certain  password  then 

To  every  breast, 
And  current  coin  that  bought  from  men 

Food,  fire,  and  rest ; 


TO  AN  OBSCURE  POET.  17 

And  these  are  more  discerning  days, 

More  coldly  just; 
I  doubt  thy  rustic  virelays 

Would  earn  a  crust. 

The  age  is  shrill  and  choral-like. 

For  many  sing  ; 
And  he  who  would  be  heard  must  strike 

Life's  loudest  string. 

And  thou,  poor  minstrel  of  the  field 

With  slender  tone, 
Art  type  of  many  a  singer  sealed 

To  die  unknown. 

And  many  a  heart  that  would  have  sung 

Songs  sweet  to  hear, 
Could  passion  give  itself  a  tongue 

To  catch  the  ear. 

But,  cricket,  thou  shouldst  trust  in  me, 

For  thou  and  I 
Are  brothers  in  adversity — 

Both  poor  and  shy. 


1 8  TO  AN  OBSCURE  POET. 

And  since  the  height  of  thy  desire 

Is  but  to  live, 
Thy  little  share  of  food  and  fire 

I  freely  give. 

And  thou  shalt  sing  of  fields  and  hills 

And  forest  streams, 
Till  thy  rapt  invocation  stills 

My  troubled  dreams. 


JOY.  19 


JOY. 

LIKE  some  winged  flake  of  evening  mist 
The  spell-dispensing  moon  has  kissed 
With  lucid  beauty  and  ethereal  fire, 

Thou  wearest  shapes  like  those  we  most  adore  ; 
But  thou  can'st  fill  the  arms  of  our  desire 
O  never  more  ! 

Thou  tempt'st  us  with  Love's  burning  eyes, 
Or  in  Ambition's  warrior  guise 
Point'st  with  thy  naked  sword  the  upward  way, 
Thrilling  and  madding  us  to  our  heart's  core  ; 
When  we  are  worn  and  old  and  cold,  thou'lt  stay 
O  never  more ! 

Thou  art  the  all-in-all  of  youth, 
The  semblance  of  a  splendid  truth  ; 
Defeated  age  seeks  thy  calm  sister  Peace, 

And  sits  in  numbed  content  beside  her  door  ; 
Thy  siren  songs  can  rouse  its  opiate  ease 
O  never  more  2 


20  TIME. 


TIME. 

A  DARK,  tumultuous  sea,  whose  hither  shore 

Is  strewn  with  wreck  of  those  who  sailed  before, 

To  seek  the  golden  lands  and  happy  isles, 

In  sunny  calms  below  the  curving  sky. 
Bidding  adieu  with  waving  hands  and  smiles, 

They  sailed  away,  and  here  their  relics  lie — 
A  silken  sail,  a  spar,  a  splintered  oar, 

A  withered  wreath,  soaked  in  the  salt  sea  spray, 

A  carven  verse  or  name,  half  worn  away — 
And  nothing  more. 


THE  OWL.  2I 


THE   OWL. 

THERE  is  no  flame  of  sunset  on  the  hill, 
There  is  no  flush  of  twilight  in  the  plain  ; 

The  day  is  dead,  the  wind  is  weird  and  shrill ; 
Amid  the  gloom  the  sheeted  shapes  of  rain 

Glide  to  and  fro  with  stealthy  feet  and  still, 
And  wilder  than  the  wood's  autumnal  moan 
A  voice  wails  through  the  night,  " Alone,  Alone!" 

No  bird  dips  down  a  moment  in  its  flight 

To  fill  the  silence  full  of  sudden  song  ; 
The  immemorial  music  of  the  night, 

When  stars  are  few  and  twilight  lingers  long, 
Is  hushed  ;  with  lone,  sharp  sound  of  wintry  blight, 

The  cricket  quavers  near  the  sheltered  stone — 

And  hark  !    the  haunting  cry,  "Alone,  Alone  !  " 

Wan  mists  on  level  marsh  and  meadow  rise, 

Like  spectral  lakes  along  whose  cloudy  gleams 
Dark  boats  are  driven,  unseen  of  mortal  eyes, 


22  THE  OWL. 

Towards  some  dim  coast,  some  island-vale  of  dreams  • 
While  on  this  desolate  shore  some  watcher  cries 
To  friends  afar  in  the  remote  unknown, 
Lamenting-  through  the  gloom,   "Alone,  alone  !  " 

The  boughs  are  shaken  in  the  bitter  sky 
With  hollow  sound  of  trouble  and  amaze  ; 

And  faster  in  the  dusk  the  dead  leaves  fly, 

Like  pallid  ghosts  pursued  through  lonely  ways  ; 

Darkly  I  watch  them  as  they  shudder  by, 
While  yet  again  in  mournful  monotone 
The  voice  repeats  my  thought,  "Alone,  alone  I" 

Night  deepens  on  the  haggard  close  of  day 
With  wilder  clamor  of  the  wind  and  rain  ; 

Louder  the  beaten  branches  groan  and  sway  ; 
And  fitfully  the  voice  comes  once  again, 

Across  the  fields,  more  faint  and  far  away — 
Is  it  the  dark  bird's  wailing  backward  blown, 
Or  my  own  heart  that  cries,  "Alone,  alone  !  "  ? 


THE  CHIMES.  23 


THE  CHIMES. 

THE  night  is  stirred  with  liquid  murmurings, 
That  ripple  softly  through  the  silent  hour, 

As  in  a  placid  pool  the  dimpled  rings 

Curve  round  the  broken  petals  of  a  flower. 

From  the  gray  steeple  pointing  to  the  stars, 
Dim  in  the  darkling  cluster  of  old  trees, 

The  golden  notes  pour  through  the  belfry  bars 
And  fill  the  air  with  choral  harmonies. 

Over  the  moonlit  hills  they  come  and  go  ; 

Over  the  misty  fields  they  melt  and  die  ; 
Over  the  glimmering  river,  sweet  and  low, 

Floating  and  failing  on  the  night-wind's  sigh  ; 

Re-moaning  through  the  arches  of  the  wood, 
Like  the  last  breathings  of  the  organ's  tone, 

When  in  an  old  cathedral's  solitude 
A  pilgrim  lingers  there  to  pray  alone; 


24  THE  CHIMES. 

Mingling  faint  echoes  with  the  bubbling  fall 
Of  waters  in  deep  glens  and  lonely  dells, 

As  at  the  close  of  some  bright  festival 

Soft  strains  of  music  blend  with  low  farewells  ; 

Whispering  sweet  dreams  in  many  a  sleeper's  ear — 
Incarnate  memories  of  other  years  ; 

Speaking  with  voices  he  no  more  shall  hear, 
So  that  he  starts  and  wakes  in  happy  tears. 


THE  WOOD  THRUSH.  25 


THE  WOOD  THRUSH. 

IN  that  soft  twilight  change  of  summer  eves 

From  rosy  bloom  to  darkness  cool  and  still, 
Sweet  from  some  dusky  haunt  among  the  leaves 

Thy  voice  is  heard  by  lonely  field  or  hill, 
Chanting  thy  low,  impassioned  vesper  hymn, 

Clear  as  the  silver  treble  of  a  stream 
Round  mossy  isles  in  woodland  valleys  dim. 

There  have  I  hearkened,  as  one  in  a  dream 
Lies  smiling,  while  some  dear  form  bent  above 

Taps  at  the  muffled  portals  of  the  brain 
With  gentle  touch  and  murmured  words  of  love 

Until  the  heart  stirs  with  a  tender  pain  ; 
\Vhile  the  wrapt  senses  soothed  in  slumbrous  balm 
Sink  down  still  deeper  in  delicious  calm. 


26  MIDNIGHT. 


MIDNIGHT. 

FAR  heard,  and  faintly,  over  wood  and  hill, 

Twelve  slow  vibrations  from  the  village  chime 

Ruffle  the  gracious  calm.     Oh,  rare  the  skill 
That  gave  so  sweet  a  voice  to  iron  time  ! 

The  airs  are  gentle  as  the  breath  of  sleep ; 

They  are  no  more  than  winged  souls  of  flowers, 
Lured  forth  by  night  from  hedgy  coverts  deep, 

Where  drowsily  they  shunned  the  glaring  hours. 

The  moon  is  up.     Now  this  were  time  to  see 
All  delicate  shy  things  that  haunt  the  wood  : 

The  mild-eyed  fauns,  the  nymphs  of  stream  and  tree, 
King  Oberon  and  all  his  fairy  brood. 

Now  from  the  folded  curtain  of  each  flower 
Small  visages  should  peer  upon  the  moon, 

To  note  if  it  be  yet  the  charmed  hour 

To  trace  the  ring  and  chaunt  the  magic  rune. 


MIDNIGHT.  27 

What  low,  delicious  sound  was  that  far  borne 
From  the  obscure  recesses  of  the  glen  ? 

Was  it  the  fanfare  of  an  elfin  horn, 

Or  restless  bird  that  trilled  and  slept  again  ? 

Is  that  the  brook's  bland  gurgle  in  the  sedge, 
Or  flag-wreathed  naiads  by  the  osiered  stream, 

Dabbling  their  white  limbs  from  the  oozy  edge, 
Or  diving  where  the  minnows  dart  and  gleam  ? 

There  is  a  rustle  in  the  thicket  screen  ! 

Is  it  a  frightened  hare  that  starts  and  flies, 
Or  stealthy-footed  faun  that  peers  between 

The  interwoven  vines  with  shy  surmise  ? 

'Twere  hardly  a  surprise  if  from  the  shades 
Pan  came,  and,  marshalling  his  merry  crew, 

Piped  to  their  dancing  in  the  moonlit  glades, 
Timing  with  horny  hoof  and  wild  halloo. 

O  for  the  fervor  of  a  Doric  prayer, 

A  Runic  spell,  or  secret  Druid  rite, 
To  call  the  forest-haunters  from  their  lair 

And  charm  the  elfin  companies  to  sight ! 


2  8  MIDNIGHT. 

For  Pan  sits  in  some  beechen  coppice  near, 

Throned  on  the  turf  amongst  his  bearded  brood 

Piping  in  undertones  we  may  not  hear, 

Or,  hearing,  deem  them  voices  of  the  wood. 

The  fauns  lurk  in  their  ivied  dens  unseen, 
The  naiads  cower  near  the  reeded  rill ; 

The  viewless  fairies  dance  upon  the  green, 
The  oreads  slumber  on  the  russet  hill. 


THE  TRYST.  29 


THE   TRYST. 

SWEET  as  the  change  from  pleasant  thoughts  to 
The  silver  gloaming  melted  into  gloom, 

Then  came  the  evening  silence  rich  and  deep, 
With  mingled  breaths  of  dew-released  perfume  ; 

The  few,  first  stars  shone  in  the  azure  pale, 

Soft  as  a  young  nun's  glances  through  her  veil. 

Was  it  for  darkness  that  thou  waited,  sweet  ? 

Ah,  though  thy  face  was  dusk  in  night's  eclipse, 
Thy  heart  betrayed  thee  by  its  quickened  beat ! 

I  needed  not  the  light  to  find  thy  lips, 
Nor  in  the  balmy  hush  of  even  time, 
To  hear  one  word  more  sweet  than  any  rhyme. 


30  SEA-FANCIES. 


SEA-FANCIES. 

THERE  is  no  cloud  upon  the  limpid  sky, 

No  blur  of  vapor  on  the  sea  beneath  ; 
The  clear  pools  on  the  rock  un wrinkled  lie, 

And,  only  stirred  as  by  an  infant's  breath, 
The  salt  grass  rustles  faint  and  fitfully. 

No  muffled  landward  echoes,  borne  afar, 
Thrill  through  the  moon-suffused  tranquillity  ; 

But  where  the  breakers  glimmer  on  the  bar 
A  long,  low  murmur,  like  a  summer  rain, 
Grows  deep  and  organ-toned,  then  fails  again. 

The  low  moon's  level  wake  across  the  waves 

Leaps  into  splendor  where  they  fall  and  rise 
In  silver-breasted  hillocks,  shadow-caves 

And  undulating  whirls,  that  cheat  the  eyes 
To  fancies  of  strange  monsters,  and  fair  shapes 

Of  nereids  and  mermaids,  crowned  with  shells 
And  soft  sea-blooms  from  Southern  coves  and  capes, 

Lifting  their  dripping  bosoms  from  the  swells 
To  gaze  upon  the  moonlit  world  awhile 
And  beckon  us  with  many  a  nod  and  smile. 


SEA-FANCIES.  3! 

And  there  are  voices  from  the  sea-chafed  rocks, 

In  slippery  clefts  and  hollows  water-worn, 
Where  pulpy  algae  trail  their  slimy  locks, — 

Strange  liquid  tones,  as  of  a  Triton's  horn, 
Blown  gurgling  through  green  shallows,  clear  and  low, 

Soft  laughter,  and  the  plash  of  curved  palms  : 
Round  lonely  isles  and  inlets,  long  ago, 

The  fisher  heard  such  sounds  through  twilight  calms 
And,  coasting  homeward,  with  hushed  utterance  told 
Of  siren  music  sung  to  harps  of  gold. 


T2fE  SPIRIT  OF  POETRY. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  POETRY. 

SHE  move  to  measures  of  ethereal  song 

Along  the  starry  corridors  of  heaven ; 
Her  tresses  float  the  moon's  white  beams  among, 

And  on  the  golden  mists  of  dawn  are  driven. 

Through  woodland  ways,  o'er  lake  and  stream,    she 
glides, 

On  mountain-peak,  in  dim,  mysterious  dell  ; 
She  rocks  in  sea-shell  boat  on  tropic  tides, 

Or  sleeps  within  some  field-born  floweret's  bell. 

Her  voice  is  heard  in  Autumn's  gusty  sigh, 
When  Summer's  tender  folk  are  perishing  ; 

She  shouts  afar  with  Winter's  boisterous  cry, 
And  hails  with  earliest  birds  the  birth  of  Spring. 

In  some  white-pillared  temple  of  the  past 
She  sits  with  hero  shades  of  deathless  name, 

With  solemn  eye  and  brow  of  tragic  cast, 

Refines  the  blood-stains  from  the  book  of  Fame. 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  POETRY.  33 

Or  in  the  East,  with  feudal  clang  and  sheen, 
Where  Murder  bears  the  cross  for  Jesus'  sake, 

She  rolls  a  purple  mist  before  the  scene 
And  bids  phantasmal  shapes  of  splendor  wake. 

She  consecrates  the  blood  in  battle  shed, 

If  tyrants  fall  or  Liberty  arise  ; 
She  flings  a  pall  of  glory  o'er  the  dead, 

Streaked  with  the  crimson  of  her  sunset  skies. 

She  comes  to  us  in  hours  of  bleakest  care, 
Unseen  till  time  has  wiped  away  our  tears  ; 

Then  trace  we  her  benignant  presence  there 
In  memory,  sadly  sweeter  through  the  years. 

Deep-veiled  she  stands  with  Grief  beside  the  tomb  ; 

Yet,  when  the  first  wild  agony  has  fled, 
She  sheds  a  hallowed  radiance  through  the  gloom, 

And  makes  all-perfect  the  imperfect  dead. 

Hers  is  the  holy  influence  of  home, — 
The  love  that  lingers  latest  in  the  breast,— 

Whatever  hopes  may  fail,  or  sorrows  come, 

The  heart's  one  friend,  the  calmest,  surest,  best. 

3 


34 


THE  SPIRIT  OF  POETRY. 

From  wilful  childhood,  pattering  through  the  rain 
To  seek  the  sun-bow's  root  behind  the  hill, 

To  manhood's  sterner  strivings,  not  less  vain, 
The  charm  is  hers  that  gilds  ambition  still. 

She  looks  upon  us  through  Love's  lucid  eyes, 
And  well  for  him  who  knows  and  holds  her  fast  ; 

For  him  life's  perfect  purpose  never  dies, 
And  loveliness  and  love  are  never  past. 

Lost  child  of  Heaven,  she  wanders  everywhere, 
And  where  she  goes  transforms  the  sordid  Real, 

Or  bursts  the  bonds  of  beauty  hiding  there  ; 
And  moulds  of  basest  clay  the  pure  Ideal. 


HE  NEEDS  NO  TEARS.  35 


HE  NEEDS  NO  TEARS. 

i. 

TEARS  for  the  unrequited  dead. 
Tears  for  the  hapless  whom  the  sun 
Of  fortune  never  shone  upon  ; 
Tears  for  the  weary  feet  that  bled 
Unseen  along  life's  thorniest  ways  ; 
For  him  whose  labors  earned  no  praise; 
For  him  who  garnered  fruitless  years ; 
Whose  lowly  love  to  man  was  given, 
And  gained  no  smile  from  man  or  heaven  ; 
For  these  be  tears. 

ii. 

But  he  whose  loftier  destiny 
Marked  him  among  the  throng  of  men 
For  fortune's  highest  honors,  then 
Ere  time  had  tarnished  them,  to  die 
And  leave  to  history  a  name 
Unspotted,  and  a  martyr's  fame ; 
Who  in  the  vigor  of  his  years 
Climbed  rugged  Glory's  final  steep 
There  made  his  bed  and  fell  asleep  ; 
He  needs  no  tears. 


36  AMBITION. 


AMBITION. 

FLY  on  thou  radiant  phantasy  ! 
Fly  on  !  but  I  will  follow  thee 
No  more  swift-shod  with  hope  to  make  thee  mine  ; 
Thou  hast  outsped  my  strength  ;  the  chase  is  o'er 
And  my  tired  steps  will  press  the  dust  of  thine 
No  more,  oh,  nevermore  ! 

Weave  thy  bright  tresses  with  the  wind, 
Turn  thy  shy  face  and  look  behind  ; 
Purse  up  thy  ruddy  mouth  and  stretch  thine  arms 
As  if  thou  wouldst  my  close  embrace  implore  ! 
But  I  will  pant  to  clasp  thy  phantom  charms 
No  more,  oh,  nevermore  ! 


THE  PROPHECY. 


37 


THE  PROPHECY. 

THOSE  who  have  looked  upon  the  dead  have  seen 

A  faint  prophetic  glory  in  the  face, 
As  if  a  light  were  breaking,  warm,  serene, 

Upon  their  vision  in  some  unknown  place. 

So  now  upon  the  ashen  clouds  there  came 
A  delicate  suffusion,  deepening  slow, 

Till  through  a  silver  rift  a  tender  flame 

Poured  a  pale  radiance  on  the  crusted  snow. 

And  far  o'er  many  a  bleak  and  haggard  mile 
Of  drifted  glen  and  desolate  white  plain, 

The  splendor  hovered,  like  a  tranquil  smile 
On  wan  lips  rigid  with  their  last  cold  pain. 

It  was  a  revelation  :  the  keen  air 

Seemed  misted  with  a  rain  of  luminous  gold, 
And  in  the  hazel  copse  and  hedge-rows  bare 

I  looked  to  see  the  first  green  buds  unfold. 


38  THE  PROPHECY. 

And  suddenly  the  mute  midwinter  gloom 
Seemed  musical  with  insect-murmuring, 

And  phantom  odors  of  the  cherry-bloom 
Woke  in  my  heart  the  ecstasy  of  spring. 

The  glory  passed  ;  again  on  field  and  hill 
Relentless  winter  frowned  in  darkest  mood, 

And  through  the  ice-bound  valleys,  rising  shrill, 
The  wind  wrung  bitter  meanings  from  the  wood. 

But  I  had  caught  the  gracious  prophecy 
Of  April  hasting  from  her  southern  bowers, 

And  felt  beneath  the  melancholy  sky 
The  tender  benediction  of  the  flowers. 


CHIME-PICTURES, 


39 


CHIME-PICTURES. 

WHAT  voice  as  of  the  tempest-trampled  sea, 

What  turbulence  of  terror  and  delight, 
What  organ-peal,  what  solemn  litany 

Clamors  along  the  quiet  aisles  of  night  ? 

What  tocsin's  moan  through  midnight  silence  falls, 
What  clash  of  arms,  what  hurrying  to  and  fro,     « 

While  grimly  serried  on  the  fortress-walls, 
The  spearmen  lean  to  watch  the  coming  foe  ? 

What  is  this  wonder  of  a  thousand  eyes 
That  flashes  far  along  the  ancient  street, 

What  throng  is  this  that  waits  with  mute  surmise, 
What  clang  of  drums,  what  tread  of  marching  feet  ? 

What  banners  blaze  from  roof  and  balcony, 

What  scarfs  from  snowy  shoulders  glimmer  down, 

While  —  hark  !  the  rending  shout  reels  to  the  sky  : 
' '  It  is  the  king  who  comes  to  claim  his  own  !  " 


40  CHIME-PICTURES. 

What  chorus  hymeneal  in  dim  shades 

Of  aged  oaks  without  the  city's  gate, 
Where   wreathed   in    May-tide  flowers,    the  blooming 
maids 

Lead  up  the  loath  young  bride  in  blushing  state  ? 

What  stir  of  wind  wing-laden  with  perfume, 

What  low  sweet  laugh  of  slow-descending  streams, 

While  curfew  bells,  far-floating  through  the  gloom, 
Pervade  the  night  with  peace  and  pleasant  dreams  ? 

It  is  the  Chime — the  graybeard  on  the  tower — 
Who  dreams  aloud  of  dead  and  buried  things  : 

Of  vanished  glory  and  departed  power, 

And  love  that  lived  in  long  forgotten  springs. 

And  like  the  flicker  fanned  in  dying  embers, 
Old  forms  and  faces  gather  round  him  fast ; 

His  heart  grows  young  again  as  he  remembers, 
Rhyme  after  rhyme,  the  poem  of  the  past. 

But  soon  his  memory  fails,  his  voice  is  gone, 
His  chant  expires  in  hollow  moans  of  pain  ; 

He  stares  around  and  finds  himself  alone, 
And  sadly  lays  him  down  to  sleep  again. 


CLEARING    WEATHER.  41 


CLEARING  WEATHER. 

BACK  where  their  parent  storm  sits  on  the  sea, 

The  broken  clouds  fly  fast  ; 
Rolled  up  like  some  defeated  enemy 
That  over  shoulder  glances  threateningly, 

Contending  to  the  last. 

The  sullen  monotone  of  falling  rain 

And  restless  wind  is  done  ; 
The  drops  are  dry  upon  the  window  pane, 
And  on  the  village  spire  the  glistening  vane 

Points  toward  the  setting  sun. 

Between  the  columns  of  the  woodland  glows 

The  glory  of  the  west ; 

Parterres  of  flower  clouds,  whence  night  bestows 
A  maiden-knot  of  jessamine  and  rose 

To  deck  the  young  moon's  breast 


42  MOONRISE. 


MOONRISE. 

i. 

ALL  unawares  the  early  stars  turn  pale  ; 

Across  their  faces,  like  a  gauzy  veil, 

A  fleecy  lustre  hangs — a  hint  of  light, 

Disclosing  slowly  on  the  rim  of  night. 

A  single  cloud,  a  wanderer  in  the  sky, 

Strayed  from  some  tempest  squadron  wheeling  by, 

Sleeps  in  the  lucent  arc  with  snowy  crest, 

And  chasms  of  amber  flame  within  its  breast. 

ii. 

Hark,  the  awaking  stir  !  the  light  winds  pass 
In  bended  lanes  across  the  ripened  grass  ; 
The  bats  like  blots  of  dusker  shadow  fly, 
With  sudden  wheel  and  feeble,  snappish  cry. 
Night  beetles  labor  by  on  crackling  wing  ; 
The  unctuous  toad  leaps  up  with  velvet  spring  ; 
The  owl's  half  human  cry  sounds  far  away, 
And  near,  the  restless  farm-dog's  pompous  bay. 
Now  on  each  tallest  tree  and  bare  hill's  brow 
There  clings  and  downward  creeps,  an  ashen  glow- 


MOONRJSE. 

Then  like  a  sudden  burst  of  melody, 
Preluding  some  majestic  symphony, 
The  full-sphered  moon  arises,  red  and  large, 
Through  mists  that  curtain  the  horizon's  marge. 

in. 

Anon  it  whitens  in  the  purer  field 
Like  some  antique,  new-polished  silver  shield, 
Blurred  with  the  dints  and  bruises  of  old  wars. 
Awhile  forget  the  lore  of  those  dim  scars, 
And  take  for  truth  the  poet-sage's  dream 
Of  tranquil  seas,  whose  azure  bosoms  gleam, 
Forever  mirroring  unclouded  skies  ; 
Of  fragrant  plains  where  summer  never  dies  ; 
Rock  grottoes,  roofed  with  pearl  and  emerald  ; 
Cool,  winding  ways,  moss-carpeted,  green  walled 
With  interwoven  shrubs  and  clustered  flowers — 
Fresh,  amaranthine,  fairer-hued  than  ours  : 
Faint  crooning  groves  that  breathe  a  spicy  balm, 
And  slumbrous  vales,  the  haunts  of  tranced  calm. 

IV. 

Alas  !  'twas  but  the  vision  of  a  seer, 

Who  drew  from  shapes  upon  yon  cloudy  sphere 

The  parable  of  longing  and  unrest 

Of  every  time  and  every  human  breast ; 


43 


44  MOONRISE. 

And  though  the  lovely  myth  has  winged  afar 
To  sightless  realms  beyond  the  palest  star, 
The  old  faith  lives,  that  somewhere  there  must  be 
Ideal  beauty  and  serenity. 


NATURE.  45 


NATURE. 

As  dwellers  near  the  border  of  the  ocean 

Hear  unaware  its  hoarse,  habitual  strife, 
The  waves  of  mighty  and  eternal  motion 

Thunder  upon  the  citied  shores  of  life 
With  strenuous  and  pervading  sound,  which  seems 

A  silence  to  the  tense,  accustomed  ear  ; 
Till,  like  awaking  from  tumultuous  dreams 

To  gentle  morning  airs  and  sunlight  clear, 
We  stand  upon  some  lone,  majestic  height, 

Full  in  the  splendor  of  deep,  smiling  skies, 
Zoned  in  pure  calm  and  pinnacled  in  light, 

Mute  .with  a  reverent  love  and  awed  surprise. 


46  HISTORY. 


HISTORY. 

THE  hearts  that  beat  a  hundred  years  ago 
Were  players  in  a  mighty  symphony  ; 
Each  heard  its  separate  part,  no  more  ;  while  we, 
Who  hear  the  solemn  measures  swell  and  flow, 
Combined  in  one  majestic  hymn,  bestow 
Upon  the  whole  the  name  of  History. 


MITHRA. 


47 


MITHRA. 

WHAT  comes  with  sound  of  stately  trumpets  pealing-, 
With  flash  of  torches,  flaring  out  the  stars  ? 

What  majesty,  what  splendor  slow  revealing, 

What  mystery  through  the  night's  unfolding  bars, 

In  gloom,  cloud-multiform,  delaying  long, 

Bursts  into  flower  of  flame  and  shower  of  song  ? 

What  march  of  multitudes  in  rhythmic  motion, 

What  thunder  of  innumerable  feet, 
WThat  mighty  diapasons  like  the  ocean, 

Reverberating  turbulently  sweet 
Through  far  dissolving  silences,  are  blown 
Worldward  upon  the  wind's  low  monotone  ? 

The  mountains  hear  the  warning  and  awaken, 
In  hushed  processional  issuing  from  the  night, 

Like  Druid  priests  with  mystic  white  robes  shaken, 
Communing  in  some  immemorial  rite  : 

Round  their  old  brows  burns  what  pale  augury, 

What  benison,  what  ancient  prophecy  ? 


4  8  MITHRA. 

The  sea  has  heard ;  through  all  its  caverns  under 
Whither  its  giant  broods  have  fled  dismayed, 

There  goes  a  voice  of  wailing  and  of  wonder  : 

"  He  comes,  with  gleaming  spears  and  ranks  arrayed, 

And  clang  of  chariot-wheels,  and  fire  of  spray  : 

We  hear,  we  fear,  we  tremble  and  obey." 

The  earth  has  heard  it,  and,  arising,  breathless, 

Sets  wide  her  doors  and  leans  with  beckoning  palms 

Over  the  quickening  east :   "  Resistless,  deathless 
Father  of  worlds  and  lord  of  storms  and  calms, 

Thou  at  whose  will  the  seasons  bloom  and  fail, 

Dispenser  and  destroyer,  hail,  all  hail  !  " 

What  are  these  prophecies  and  preludes  golden, 
Legends  of  light,  and  clarions  that  blow  ? 

What  is  this  secret  of  the  skies,  long  holden 
In  star-girt  solitudes,  disclosing  now  ? 

Tis  manifest — 'tis  here  ;  the  doubt  is  done  : 

The  day-heart  leaps  and  throbs — behold  the  sun  ! 


SONG— THE  VIGIL. 


49 


SONG— THE  VIGIL. 

O  LOVE,  why  wilt  thou  banish  me  so  soon  ? 

See,  yonder  floats  the  crescent  moon, 

A  shining  boat  becalmed  on  azure  seas 

Among  the  twinkling  Pleiades  ; 

And  not  one  star  has  quenched  its  crystal  lamp 

In  haggard  daybreak's  dew  and  damp. 

No  spectral  glimmer  streaks  the  eastern  skies, 
Night  lingers  still  ;  look  up,  dear  eyes, 
Faint  beacons  lit  for  love,  thy  tender  shine 
Betrays  thee  to  no  gaze  but  mine  : 
And  none  can  hear  lips  meeting  in  a  kiss 
So  hushed,  my  sweet,  as  this — and  this  ! 

Why  tremble  so  ?     In  slumber  fathoms  deep 

They  lie  who  bid  us  part  and  weep, 

Dreaming  their  sleek  white  dove  in  perfumed  nest 

Sleeps  safe  in  unregretful  rest 

Let  them  dream  on  deluded,  while  we  wake 

The  long  night  through  for  love's  sweet  sake. 


50  -   THE  HOUR. 


THE  HOUR. 

i. 

I  AM  the  daughter  of  the  buried  past, 

The  destined  mother  of  the  years  to  come ; 
On  all  that  was  I  close  the  portals  fast, 

And  all  that  is  to  be  lies  in  my  womb. 
I  come  from  those  dark  realms  which  lie  before — 
Time's  lightless  wastes,  where  thought  itself  is  blind  ; 
I  go  to  that  pale  coast  called  Nevermore, 

Where  dwell  the  shades  of  my  departed  kind — 
Dim  melancholy  shapes  that  backward  glance, 

And  weep  and  linger,  turning  at  no  call  ; 
Or  bright  forms  fading  in  harmonious  dance, 

With  tender  parting  smiles  more  sad  than  all. 

ii. 
I  speed  to  earth  along  the  sun's  slant  beam, 

Among  the  shimmering  motes  that  hover  there, 
On  wings  so  still  and  silken,  that  they  deem 

Me,  like  themselves,  an  aimless  child  of  air. 
They  are  the  glittering  sparkles  of  decay 

From  earth's  unstable  crust,  its  towns  and  towers, 
And  from  the  bones  of  men  that  mould  away, 

Struck  by  the  swift  heel  of  the  passing  Hours  :— 


THE  HOUR.  5  i 

The  cloven  crowns  of  kings  whose  baleful  frown 

Through  crouching  nations  shot  the  bolt  of  death  ; 
The  piled-up  pride  of  centuries,  toppled  down 

And  ground  to  wreck  impalpable  beneath 
The  desolating  tread  of  my  strong  race. 

Would  ye  behold  Troy,  Carthage,  Babylon  ? 
The  sullen  waste  imparts  no  more  their  place ; 

Their  nameless  dust  is  dancing  in  the  sun. 
And  I,  the  youngest,  too,  shall  claim  my  share ; 

Build  high,  build  strong  !  cement  with  blood  and  tears  ! 
And  I  will  come  and  people  the  thin  air 

With  such  winged  relics  of  the  toil  of  years. 

in. 
My  face  is  veiled,  and  while  I  live  no  eye 

Beholds  my  brow  or  guesses  at  my  mien  ; 
But  when,  transfixed  by  Time,  I  fall  and  die, 

The  Hour  that  is  to  be  shall  lift  the  screen. 
Then  shall  be  known  if  I  was  foul  or  fair — 

If  peace  sat  on  my  silent  lips,  or  pain, 
Or  such  rare  loveliness  that  ye  would  dare — 

If  I  could  hear — to  call  me  back  again. 
Look  well  in  my  still  lineaments  and  say 

Was  I  a  loving  friend  or  ruthless  foe  ? 
Were  my  caresses  sweet  ?  did  I  betray  ? 

Accuse  me  or  lament,  I  shall  not  know. 


52  IMPLORA  PACE. 

IMPLORA  PACE. 

IN    THE    CEMETERY    OF    CERTOSA. 

I  STOOD  within  the  cypress  gloom 
Where  old  Ferrara's  dead  are  laid, 

And  mused  on  many  a  sculptured  tomb, 
Moss-grown  and  mouldering  in  the  shade. 

And  there  was  one  the  eye  might  pass, 
And  careless  foot  might  tread  upon 

A  crumbling  tablet  in  the  grass, 

With  weeds  and  wild  vines  overrun. 

In  the  dim  light  I  stooped  to  trace 
The  lines  the  time-worn  marble  bore, 

Of  reverent  praise  or  prayer  for  grace — 
"  Implora  Pace  !  " — nothing  more. 

Name,  fame  and  rank,  if  any  were, 

Had  long  since  vanished  from  the  stone, 

Leaving  the  meek,  pathetic  prayer, 
"  Peace  I  implore  !  "  and  this  alone. 


EVENING. 


EVENING. 

I  FEEL  the  cool  breath  of  the  coming  night, 

Sweet  with  the  scent  of  meadows  and  new  hay, 
And  subtly  as  a  failing  of  the  sight 

The  dusk  invisibly  dissolves  the  day. 
Still  in  the  west  an  arc  of  primrose  light 

Crowns  like  an  aureole  the  mountain's  brow, 
Flecked  with  thin  sprays  of  palest  red  and  gold, 

And  through  its  lambent  heart  is  piercing  now 
The  point  of  one  large  star,  keen,  still  and  cold. 

The  east  lies  in  the  arms  of  night ;  the  eye 

No  longer  marks  the  lines  of  hedge  and  lane, 
The  russet  stacks  and  squares  of  husbandry, 

The  shaven  stubble  and  the  furrowed  plain  ; 
But  over  all  a  clear  obscurity — 

A  pearly  gloom  lit  from  the  lucid  skies — 
Hangs  like  a  tenuous  veil,  through  which  is  seen 

A  world  transformed  to  unfamiliar  guise 
Of  darkling  loveliness,  cool,  dim,  serene. 


53 


54  SONG— REGRET. 


SONG— REGRET. 

THERE  was  a  time  when  I  was  not ; 
There  comes  a  time  I  shall  not  be  ; 
This  conscious  dust,  its  joys  and  tears, 
Its  fragile  hopes  and  foolish  fears, 
Shall  pass  away  and  be  forgot — 
Ah,  even  by  thee  ! 

The  spring  blooms  on  the  ruined  year, 
The  old  is  buried  in  the  new  ; 

And  who  remembers  last  year's  flowers, 
Its  pleasant  skies  and  sunny  hours, 
Or  gives  the  vanished  past  a  tear  ? 
Alas  !  how  few  ! 

'Tis  well.     What  nature  does  is  best ; 
'Tis  well  fpr  us  we  can  forget, 
And  after  sorrow  smile  again  ; 
Else  life  were  but  an  endless  pain, 
And  memory  one  bitter  quest, 
One  long  regret. 


THE   LOTUS  FLOWER.  55 


THE   LOTUS   FLOWER. 

OH,  in  what  lonely  valley,  dimly  seen 

Through  dusky  aisles  of  immemorial  trees, 

Or  on  what  lovely  island,  couched  serene 
In  azure  zones  of  unfrequented  seas, 
Blossoms  the  Lotus,  fabled  flower  of  ease? 

For  none  have  found  it  in  the  city  street, 
Among-  the  wicked  weeds  that  rankle  there, 

The  matted  sins  that  snare  unwary  feet, 

The  poison  growth  of  slander,  shame  and  care, 
The  hemlock  leaves  of  anguish  and  despair. 

Even  in  the  fair,  benignant  face  of  heaven, 
On  sunny  plain  or  solitary  hill, 

At  noon  or  night,  some  drop  of  bitter  leaven, 
Some  sinister  surmise,  some  haunting  ill, 
Taints  the  clear  cup  of  nature's  quiet  still.  • 


5 6  THE   LOTUS  FLOWER. 

It  is  not  bought  with  wealth,  nor  bribed  by  power  ; 
The  golden  garnerings  of  insatiate  gain 

Win  not  its  balm  for  one  oblivious  hour  ; 
And  stricken  kings  'neath  canopies  of  pain, 
Clasp  burning  palms  and  pray  for  it  in  vain. 

And  oh  !  not  in  love's  stormy  realm  it  grows — 
Love,  whose  inviolable  trust  denies 

To  aching  hearts  and  watching  eyes  repose  ; 
Love  that  is  sorrow  in  divine  disguise, 
Whose  mission  and  reward  are  sacrifice. 

Sweeter  than  love,  or  hope,  or  fame's  false  charm, 
Honors,  or  gold,  or  fortune's  vain  caprice ! 

No  brow  has  worn  the  coronal  of  calm, 

No  toil-worn  slave  of  time  has  earned  release 
This  side  the  grave  ;  the  dead  alone  find  peace. 


ROMANCE.  57 


ROMANCE. 

ROMANCE,  twin-child  with  Beauty,  shall  not  die 
While  yet  To-morrow  smiles  across  To-night, 

Or  yet  in  sea,  or  land,  or  farthest  sky, 

One  secret  place  lies  hidden  from  the  sight. 

The  new-born  child  that  wonders  at  the  moon 
Floats  into  being  on  a  sea  of  dreams  ; 

And  through  phantasmal  dawn  to  broad,  bright  noon, 
The  distant  Eldorado  glows  and  gleams. 

The  withered  Past  has  left  its  flower  behind  ; 

Though  time  has  swept  the  feudal  world  away, 
Knights-errant,  dreamers  still,  we  ride  to  find 

Our  princess  and  our  golden  lands  to-day. 


58  THE  AWAKENING. 

THE  AWAKENING. 

A  SPIRIT  from  the  south  through  drifted  glens 

And  o'er  the  naked  woods  and  wilds  has  flown  ; 
Slipped  from  their  leashes  in  the  mountain-dens, 

With  deep  and  hollow  voice,  the  streams  rush  down, 
Searching  the  level  fields  and  sunken  fens, 

And  round  soft,  sodden  banks  and  hillocks  bare, 

Whirling  in  turbid  circles  everywhere. 

The  spongy  soil  sinks  weltering  to  the  foot, 
And  still  thin,  dusky  streaks  of  crusted  snow 

In  cold  shades  linger  on  the  hemlock's  root ; 
But  all  the  open  lawns  and  meadows  glow 

With  faint  warm  flame  of  many  a  tender  shoot  ; 
The  hazel  stems  are  bright  with  burnished  green, 
And  russet-hooded  buds  spring  up  between. 

The  plains  are  full  of  mingled  mist  and  light ; 

Cloud-shadows  cross  the  hills  with  sudden  showers 
The  dawn  in  frosty  calm  breaks  cold  and  white, 

Ripening  to  golden  bloom  at  noonday  hours  ; 
Shrill  winds  and  winter  flurries  blur  the  night, 

And  in  the  glimpses  of  the  rifted  skies 

The  young  moon's  slender  crescent  gleams  and  dies. 


SONG— WHILE  LOVE  IS  NEW.  59 


SONG— WHILE  LOVE  IS  NEW. 

SWEET  sound    love's  vows  in  lovers'  ears 

While  love  is  new  ; 
But  how  if  love,  through  trials  and  tears 
And  wiser  thoughts  of  graver  years, 

Grow  wiser,  too  ? 

Dear  are  love's  smiles  to  lovers'  eyes 

While  love  is  new  ; 

But  how  when  smiles  are  changed  to  sighs, 
And  eyes  grow  dim  and  beauty  dies, 

Will  love  die,  too  ? 

Ah  !  better  then  that  love  were  slain 

While  it  is  new  ; 

Faith  were  but  folly,  hope  a  bane 
And  youth  a  dream  and  manhood  vain, 

If  love  die,  too. 


6c  THE  BURDEN  OF  TIME. 


THE  BURDEN  OF  TIME. 

IN  cloudy  legends  of  the  dawn  of  years, 

Or  sculptured  verse  on  shard  or  shattered  stone, 

The  oldest  lore  is  still  of  love  and  tears, 
Of  wild  dark  wars  and  cities  overthrown, 

And  blows  and  bitter  deeds  and  mad  defeat, 

Whereof  the  burden  is,  "Yet  love  is  sweet." 

And  from  all  ways,  where  men  have  dwelt  and  died, 
From  nations  dwindled  to  a  minstrel's  song, 

A  sound  of  voices,  mingled,  multiplied, 
A  rumor  of  delight,  despair  and  wrong, 

Of  sorrows  infinite  and  strange  amaze, 

Waft  down  the  troubled  winds  of  many  days. 

Crying  :   ' '  We  were  love's  votaries  of  old  ; 

Though  dust,  our  immemorial  names  remain 
Embalmed  in  tales  a  thousand  times  retold, 

That  beat  like  echoes  in  the  heart  and  brain, 


THE  BURDEN  OF  TIME.  61 

Of  stately  strains  through  whose  exultant  flow 
Breathe  parting  sighs,  vain  longings,  utter  woe." 

Crying  :    ' '  Ten  years  against  the  city's  walls 
The  brazen  waves  of  battle  beat  in  vain, 

And  many  a  widow  wailed  in  Dardan  halls, 
And  many  a  Greek  lay  cold  along  the  plain, 

Till  hapless  Troy  expired  in  blood  and  flame 

And  grew  a  word  for  Helen's  love  and  shame." 


Crying  :   "I  am  Leander,  whom  the  sea 
Spared  to  young  Hero's  arms  a  little  space, 

Then   seized  and  smote  the  life  out  suddenly, 
One  black  and  bitter  night,  before  her  face  ; 

But  we  had  loved,  nor  gods  nor  mortals  may 

Efface  the  perfect  past — we  had  our  day  ;  " 

Crying  :   "The  proud,  sweet  mouth  and  subtle  smile, 
The  varying  mood,  the  dusk,  low-lidded  gaze, 

Stayed  my  war-wandering  steps  beside  the  Nile ; 
There,  hand  in  hand,  down  love's  delicious  ways, 

We  walked  to  death,  foreseeing,  unafraid, 

And  passed  from  dreams  to  darkness,  well  repaid.' 


62  THE  BURDEN  OF  TIME. 

But  these  are  intimations  faint  with  time  ; 

Hark,  how  from  hearts  that  tremble  and  aspire, 
Albeit  unknown  in  any  poet's  rhyme, 

The  passion-song  leaps  up  like  living  fire  !— 
"  Travail  and  tears,  wan  brows  and  wounded  feet, 
These  are  love's  sure  award — yet  love  is  sweet." 


SONG.  63 


SONG. 

COULD  I  love  thee  so  well  and  thou  not  love  me,  sweet? 
Though  lips  be  silent,  eyes  speak  volumes  when  they 

meet ; 

I  know  not  what  mine  eyes  betrayed  to  thee,  but  I 
Cried  with  my  soul's  voice — "Thou  must  love  me  or  I 

die  ! " 

I  held  thy  hand ;  its  pulses  seemed  to  beat  soft  time 
To  some  mysterious  measure  of  delicious  rhyme  ; 
I  know  not  what  my  touch  confessed  to  thee,  but  I 
Cried  with  my  soul's  voice — "  Thou  must  love  me  or  I 

die  !  " 

I  spake  thy  name — word  sweeter  ne'er   was   said  or 

sung— 

And  lo  !  it  seemed  that  all  the  evening  silence  rung 
With  voices  echoing   "  Love!  "  and  "  Love  !  "  again  ; 

but  I 
Cried  with  my  soul's  voice — "  Thou  must  love  me  or  I 

die  !  " 


f)4  SONG. 

The  stars  shone  faintly  in  the  windows  of  the  night, 

And  I  was  but  a  shadow's  shadow  in  thy  sight ; 

But   there   thou   heard   and   answered,    "I   am  thine," 

while  I 
Cried  with  my  soul's  voice — "  Thou  must  love  me  or  I 

die  !  " 


THE  KING  AND  THE  POET.  65 


THE  KING  AND  THE  POET.* 

THE  people  bowed  before  his  throne  ; 

No  eye  dared  look  upon  his  face  ; 
His  splendid  cohorts  round  him  shone, 

And  satraps  of  a  royal  race. 

His  heart  beat  high  ;  he  bade  them  raise 
A  mighty,  monumental  stone, 

Whereby  his  name  and  power  and  praise 
To  future  ages  should  be  known. 

That  self-same  hour  a  poet  lay 
Musing  beside  a  forest  stream  ; 

Before  his  door  at  close  of  day 

He  told  the  shepherd  folk  his  dream. 

The  stone  is  dust :  the  monarch's  name 
By  men  has  been  forgotten  long ; 

But  the  unconscious  poet's  fame 
Is  fresh  as  his  immortal  song. 


*  "  This  battered  shaft,  evidently  a  monolith  commemorating  some  great  victory 
is  all  that  remains  to  attest  the  power  and  glory  of  the  sovereign  of  forty  millions  of 
people.  We  do  not  even  know  his  name."— Notes  on  the  Cuneiform  Inscriptions. 


66  WINTER— A  LAMENT. 


WINTER— A  LAMENT. 

O  SAD-VOICED  winds  that  sigh  about  my  door  ! 
Ye  mourn  the  pleasant  hours  that  are  no  more, 

The  tender  graces  of  the  vanished  spring, 
The  sultry  splendor  of  long  summer  days, 

The  songs  of  birds,  and  streamlets  murmuring, 
And  far  hills  dimly  seen  through  purple  haze. 

Still  as  the  shrouded  dead  the  cold  earth  lies  ; 
Sunless  and  sullen  droop  the  troubled  skies  ; 

There  is  no  sound  within  the  leafless  wood, 
No  mellow  echo  on  the  barren  hill  ; 

Hushed  is  the  piping  of  the  insect  brood, 
And,,  hushed  the  gurgle  of  the  meadow-rill. 

By  rutted  lanes  the  tangled  green  is  gone  ; 
The  vine  no  longer  hides  the  naked  stone, 

But  with  its  skeleton  black  fingers  clings, — 
Its  clustered  berries,  withered  on  the  stem, 

Held  sadly  out  like  humble  offerings, 
Too  poor  for  any  hand  to  gather  them. 


WINTER— A  LAMENT.  67 

On  hill-side  pastures  where  the  panting  sheep 
Hid  from  high  noon  in  piny  shadows  deep, 

In  level  lawns  with  daisies  overcast, 
The  haunts  of  belted  bees  and  butterflies, 

The  sere  grass  whistles  in  the  cutting  blast, 
The  wrinkled  mould  in  frozen  furrows  lies. 

Now  o'er  the  landscape  dreary  and  forsaken, 
Like  some  thin  veil  by  unseen  ringers  shaken, 

The  snow  comes  softly  hovering  through  the  air, 
Flake  after  flake  in  crossing  threads  of  white, 

Weaving  in  misty  mazes  everywhere, 
Till  forest,  field,  and  hill  are  shut  from  sight. 

0  sad-voiced  winds,  that  sigh  about  my  door  ! 

1  mourn  with  ye  the  hours  that  are  no  more. 
My  heart  is  weary  of  the  sullen  sky, 

The  leafless  branches,  and  the  frozen  plain  ; 
I  long  to  hear  the  earliest  wild-bird's  cry 
And  see  the  earth  in  gladsome  green  again. 


68  NOCTURNE. 


NOCTURNE. 

SLOWLY,  with  grateful  calm,  the  night  has  come, 
And  the  exultant  life  which  filled  the  air 

With  fanning  wings  and  song  and  sound  is  dumb ; 
Each  piping  pleasurer  has  found  its  lair, 
And  sleep  and  utter  peace  reign  everywhere. 

There  is  no  stir  of  wind  among  the  leaves, 
And  not  one  wrinkle  on  the  darkling  stream  ; 

The  reeds  stand  motionless  in  clustered  sheaves, 
And  through  the  shades  the  water-lilies  gleam, 
Floating,  enfolded  in  a  languorous  dream. 

From  many  flowers  that  nestle  out  of  sight 
In  dewy  lawns  and  dusky  thicket-dells, 

Commingled  odors  tremble  through  the  night, 
So  faint,  so  subtly  sweet,  they  seem  like  swells 
Of  thin  ethereal  music  from  their  bells. 

Sweet  is  the  cool,  fresh  fragrance  of  the  grass, 
The  spicy  incense  of  the  firs  and  pines  ; 

And  sweet  the  dead  leaves,  rustled  where  I  pass, 
The  humid  breath  of  moss  and  creeping  vines, 
And  vapory  marshes  where  the  fen-fire  shines. 


NOCTURNE.  69 

Through  leaf-fringed  oriels  rifted  in  the  gloom, 
Glimpses  of  limpid  azure  glimmer  down, 

Serenely  clear,  and  hazed  with  pearly  bloom 

Of  clustered  stars,  like  golden  grain  thick  strown, 
And  nebulous  pale  tresses  backward  blown. 

Rapt  in  the  odorous  solitude  and  calm, 
I  feel  the  joy  of  far  primeval  nights, 

When  on  his  tower  the  Sabean  wrought  his  charm, 
And  shepherd-watchers  on  Ausonian  heights 
Wove  legends  from  the  constellated  lights. 

And  some  night-lover  of  a  future  race, 

Loitering  beneath  new  glooms  of  branch  and  bough  ; 
And  haply  gazing  through  some  verdurous  space, 

Shall  pause  and  watch  Orion  rising  slow 

In  silent  ecstacy — as  I  do  now. 


JO  FAME. 

FAME. 

i. 

"  WHO  built  this  lofty  pile  ?  " 
I  asked  the  sullen  porter  at  the  gate. 

"  His  was  a  noble  style 
And  matchless  art     What  were  his  name  and  fate? " 

Uprising  stiff  and  slow, 

With  sharp  rheumatic  creak  and  muttering  low — 
"  I  never  heard  his  name  nor  cared  to  hear," 

He  answered  grudgingly. 

"  He  has  been  dead  and  dust  for  many  a  year  : 
What  is  the  man  to  me  ? " 

ii. 

In  a  forgotten  nook, 
Flung  out  of  sight  to  rot  in  damp  and  murk, 

I  found  a  tattered  book. 
"  Whose  was  the  hand  that  penned  this  glorious  work  ?  " 

I  asked  my  surly  guide  ; 

"  His  deathless  fame  is  sure  his  nation's  pride." 
"  How  should  I  know,"  he  said  with  crabbed  scorn, 

"  Some  arrant  fool  or  liar  ! 
Give  me  the  trash,  'twill  serve  some  winter  morn 

To  light  my  kitchen  fire." 


MUSIC.  71 


MUSIC. 

I  HEAR  the  ocean's  deep  vibrating-  tone 

From  emerald  caverns  where  sea-fairies  dream  ; 

Or  from  the  sands  of  southern  islands  lone, 

Where  azure  veined  shells  and  corals  gleam  : — 

Entranced  I  hear,  and  ere  I  am  aware, 

The  green  waves  sparkle  round  me  everywhere. 

I  hear  a  shrill  tumultuous  glad  cry, 

The  clang  of  brass  and  tread  of  armed  feet, 

And  round  me  lances  bristle,  pennons  fly, 

And  shouting  crowds  surge  through  the  quaint  old 
street. 

Who  comes  ?     What  day  is  this  ?     What  festive  town  ? 

What  victory  stirs  my  heart  with  dead  renown  ? 

The  clangor  melts  to  sweetness,  and  I  hear 
The  sighing  sounds  of  a  soft  summer  night  ; 

I  feel  the  heart  of  many  a  vanished  year 

Throbbing  in  mine  with  anguish  and  delight ; 

I  live  with  Beauty  death  has  made  divine, 

And  lips  of  storied  love  are  pressed  to  mine. 


7 2  MUSIC. 

I  hear  the  stir  of  wind  among-  the  trees, 

The  song  of  birds,  the  brook's  low,  reedy  croon, 

The  pipe  of  grasshoppers,  the  hum  of  bees, 
Making  a  murmur  in  the  hot  bright  noon  ;— 

I  hear  and  half  forget  this  joyous  day 

Crowned  some  fair  summer,  long  since  passed  away. 


A  WINTER  EVENING. 


73 


A  WINTER  EVENING. 

LIKE  some  triumphal  Orient  pageantry, 
Beheld  afar  in  slow  and  stately  march, 

Glittering  with  gold  and  crimson  blazonry, 
Till  lost  at  length  through  many  a  dusky  arch, 

I  saw  the  day's  last  clustered  spears  of  light 

Enter  the  clouded  portals  of  the  night. 

The  wind  whose  brazen  clarions  had  blown 

Imperious  fanfarons  before  the  sun 
All  the  brief  winter  afternoon,  died  down, 

And  in  the  hush  of  twilight,  one  by  one, 
Like  maidens  leaning  from  high  balconies, 
The  early  stars  looked  forth  with  veiled  eyes. 

Then  came  the  moon  like  a  deserted  queen 
In  blanched  weed  and  pensive  loveliness  ; 

Not  as  she  rises  in  midsummer  green, 
Hailed  by  a  festal  world  in  gala  dress, 

With  thin  sweet  incense  swung  from  buds  and  leaves 

And  strident  minstrelsy  of  August  eves  ; 


74  A    WINTER  EVENING. 

But  treading  in  cold  calm  the  frozen  plain 
With  bare  white  feet  and  argent  torch  aloft, 

Unheralded  through  all  her  drear  domain 

Save  where  the  cricket  sang  in  sheltered  croft, 

And  faintly  heard  in  fitful  monotone, 

A  solitary  owl  made  shuddering  moan. 


DOUBT. 


DOUBT. 

IF  we  were  called  from  nothing  but  to  dream 
A  restless  hour  of  phantom  joy  and  pain  ; 
If  Birth  and  Life  and  Death  are  what  they  seem — 
What  sorry  jests  we  are,  how  poor  and  vain  ! 
If  Being  has  no  more  to  give. 

If  we  are  but  the  naked  brood  of  Chance, 
Bewildered  stragglers  toward  no  destined  bourn- 
Foiled  and  misled  by  jeering  Circumstance 
Till  trapped  to  death,  then  it  were  wise  to  spurn 
The  worthless  heritage  of  breath. 

But  if  for  purpose  wiser  than  we  know 
The  pallid  shadow.we  call  Life  is  given— 
If  guided  on  some  steadfast  way  we  go 
Through  storm  and  darkness  toward  a  quiet  haven, 
Then  it  is  glorious  to  live. 


76  DOUBT. 

If  dying  is  but  passage,  and  the  tomb 
The  solemn  portal  to  sublimer  life, 
In  slumber,  sweet  as  love,  borne  through  the  gloom, 
We  leave  behind  the  sadness  and  the  strife — 
Then  doubly  glorious  is  death. 


FROST.  77 


FROST. 

THE  pane  is  etched  with  wondrous  tracery ; 

Curve  interlaced   with  curve  and  line  with  line, 
Like  subtle  measures  of  sweet  harmony 

Transformed  to  shapes  of  beauty  crystalline. 

Slim,  graceful  vines  and  tendrils,  of  such  sort 
As  never  grew  save  in  some  fairy  world, 

Wind  up  from  roots  of  misted  silver  wrought 
Through  tulip  flowers  and  lilies  half  unfurled. 

Shag  firs  and  hemlocks  blend  with  plumy  palms, 
Spiked  cacti  spring  from  feathery  ferns  and  weeds, 

And  sea-blooms,  such  as  rock  in  Southern  calms, 
Mingle  their  foamy  fronds  with  sedge  and  reeds. 

And  there  are  flights  of  birds  with  iris  wings 
That  shed  in  mid-air  many  a  brilliant  plume, 

And  scintillating  shoals  of  swimming  things 
That  seem  to  float  in  clear  green  ocean  gloom. 


78  FROST. 

And  there  are  diamond-crusted  diadems, 
And  orbs  of  pearl  and  sceptres  of  pale  gold, 

Stored  up  in  crystal  grottoes,  lit  with  gems 
And  paved  with  emeralds  of  price  untold. 

And  marvellous  architecture  of  no  name, 

Fa9ades  and  shafts  of  loveliest  form  and  hue, 

Keen  pinnacles  and  turrets  tipped  with  flame, 
And  fretted  domes  of  purest  sapphire  blue. 

All  these  the  genii  of  the  Frost  last  night 

Wrought  through  the  still  cold  hours  by  charm  and 

rune  ; 
And  now,  like  dreams  dispelled  before  the  light, 

They  float  away  in  vapor  on  the  noon. 


LAMENT. 


LAMENT. 

THE  beauty  has  not  passed  away  from  spring, 
Nor  the  blue  splendor  from  the  summer  skies  ; 

No  note  is  gone  from  songs  the  wild  birds  sing, 
No  mellow  tone  from  forest  harmonies. 
But  oh,  my  heart  has  lost  the  sense 
Of  all  their  sound  and  radiance  ! 
I  look  upon  the  fields  with  languid  eyes 
And  find  no  more  the  freshness  and  the  charm ; 

I  hear  the  soft  earth-voices  murmuring, 
But  only  long  for  silence  and  for  calm. 


8o  KNOWLEDGE. 


KNOWLEDGE. 

TAKE  to  thyself  wings  of  the  speed  of  light, 

And  toward  the  outmost,  visible,  dim  star 
That  glimmers  in  the  cold  abysm  of  night, 

Urge  thy  immeasurable  course  afar, 
Till  thought  itself  is  weary  with  the  flight ; 

Beyond  thee  yet  unfathomed  regions  are ; 
Above,  below,  the  solemn  Infinite 

Reveals  no  goal,  no  barrier,  no  bar. 

So  ii.i  the  shoreless  universe  of  mind, 

The  Known  is  but  a  hint  of  the  Unknown, 
A  twilight  glimpse  of  glories  undefined  ; 

Yet  when  a  hundred  centuries  have  flown, 
Thought  ever  flashing  onward  unconfined, 

The  coming  men,  majestic  giants  grown, 
Shall  grope,  as  we  do  now,  confused  and  blind, 

Upon  the  borders  of  a  boundless  zone. 


CARLYLE.  8 1 


CARLYLE. 

1883. 

ICONOCLAST,  thou,  too,  art  overthrown  ! 
Death,  merciless  as  thou,  hath  torn  thee  down 
From  that  high  place  where  thou  didst  sit  and  frown— 
-  Mocking  all  human  weakness  save  thine  own. 
A  warrior  thou,  and  yet  thou  didst  not  meet 
Thy  fate  with  lofty  fortitude  resigned  ; 
But  like  a  Parthian,  direst  in  defeat, 
A  flight  of  poisoned  arrows  shot  behind. 
Fame  tramples  on  thy  name  as  thou  didst  tread 
With  iron  heel  upon  the  illustrious  dead. 
Ah,  well  for  thee  if  thou  hadst  knelt  and  wept 
In  manly  silence  where  thy  brothers  slept ! 
Thy  tears  had  sweetened  all  thy  bitter  leaven, 
And  for  forgiving,  thou  hadst  been  forgiven. 

Who  made  thee  judge  ?  Hadst  thou  no  weakness,  too  ? 
No  kindred  crumbling  of  our  common  clay, 
That  thou  shouldst  tear  death's  kindly  veil  away 
And  hold  the  meaner  part  of  genius  up  to  view  ? 
They  called  thee  Friend,  and  laid  their  bosoms  bare— 
Thou  sawest  only  what  what  was  poorest  there  ; 


82  CARLYLE. 

The  rich,  the  lofty  and  the  sweet,  thine  eye 
Marked  not,  or  marking,  passed  them  sneering  by. 
Thou  hadst  too  little  mercy  to  be  just : 
Unkind  !  at  thy  command  behold  them  crawl — 
Sad,  shambling  phantoms,  shaped  of  hallowed  dust ! 
Unwise  !  thy  haggard  figure  heads  them  all. 

Tormented  by  the  vultures  of  disease, 

An  egotist  of  pain,  thou  sawest  men 

Through  the  dark  medium  of  thine  agonies  ; 

And  in  thine  own  hot  gall  didst  dip  thy  pen, 

And  Cowards,  Fools  and  Knaves  didst  write  them  down 

Life  early  looked  upon  thee  with  a  frown, 

And  thou  didst  nurse  the  insult  in  thy  brain, 

Till,  certain  of  thy  strength,  with  fierce  disdain, 

Tenfold  thou  didst  repay  thyself  again. 

And  thou  wert  strong  !    Magician  of  the  spell 
That  raised  the  spectres  of  the  headless  dead, 
Who  rolled  in  blood  beneath  a  nation's  tread, 
While  Freedom  wallowed  in  her  crimson  hell ! 
Ca  ira!  hark,  the  tramp  of  marching  feet  ! 
Hark  to  the  tumbrels  jolting  through  the  street, 
The  clashing  guillotine  that  never  tires, 
Till  Terror,  strangled  with  excess,  expires  ! 


CARLYLE.  83 

Such  strength  was  thine.     Ah,  had  there  been  in  thee 

More  of  the  gentleness  thou  didst  despise  ; 

Had  Man  seemed  less  unlovely  in  thine  eyes, 

Thy  faults,  the  heirlooms  of  mortality, 

His  loving  hands  had  buried  with  thy  frame; 

Sealing  unblemished  to  posterity 

The  glory  of  a  high  and  hallowed  name. 


34  HERO  WORSHIP. 


HERO  WORSHIP. 

IDOLS  of  wood  and  stone,  conquerors  and  kings — 
Creatures  of  gilded  dust  with  feet  of  clay — 

See  how  the  nations  worship  these  vain  things 
A  breath  has  made,  a  breath  might  sweep  away  ! 

Puppets,  lost  in  the  lustre  of  a  crown, 

Imperial  but  by  irony  of  birth, 
Unworthy  heritors  of  old  renown, 

Yet  more  than  gods  to  half  the  heedless  earth  ; 

Soldiers,  who  leave  posterity  a  name, 
A  statue  in  the  shrine  of  fear  and  hate. — 

To  nobler  minds  the  synonym  of  shame, 
An  effigy  to  scorn  and  execrate  ; 

Leaders  of  State,  coiners  of  ringing  phrase, 
Prating  of  common  weal  and  patriotism, 

Insatiate  pensioners  of  public  praise, 
Froth  on  the  fickle  tide  of  party  schism  ; 


HERO  WORSHIP.  g« 

To  these  the  world  bows  down,  the  incense  fumes  ; 

Fame  in  her  false  and  florid  blazonry, 
Inscribes  the  legends  of  their  deeds  and  dooms, 

And  credulous  history  repeats  the  lie. 

But  there  are  lofty  spirits  in  disguise, 

Heroes  in  common  garb,  whose  meek  brows  bear 
The  thorny  crown  of  perfect  sacrifice, 

Whose  simple  souls  are  kingly  unaware  ; 

Lives  to  one  sacred  mission  consecrate 
Of  duty  death  alone  can  swerve  them  from, 

Or  love  that  glorifies  their  lowly  state 

Through  fiery  pangs  of  lifelong  martyrdom. 

They  tread  with  us  the  dusty  paths  of  time, 

Or  lie  in  uncommemorative  sod, 
Unrecognized,  unhonored,  yet  sublime, 

Their  greatness  witnessed  only  by  their  God. 


8 6  DECEMBER—AN  ELEG  Y. 


DECEMBER— AN   ELEGY. 

THE  summer's  wreath  is  withered  in  the  plain, 
And  Autumn's  graver  garb  of  dusky  gold 

Lies  strewn  in  sombre  glen  and  silent  lane, 
And  winter,  like  a  palmer  sable-stoled, 

Watches  with  cold  unsympathetic  eyes 

The  dying  year's  faint,  final  agonies. 

Ay,  summer  is  no  more  ;  afar  I  hear 

A  heavy  sigh  and  sound  among  the  leaves, 

As  of  the  feet  of  those  who  bear  a  bier 

With  wailing  voices ;  'tis  the  wind  that  grieves, 

Seeking  through  lone,  dim  vales  and  woodlands  dun 

The  bright  departed  children  of  the  sun. 

And  I,  too,  seek  in  places  well-remembered, 
Some  lingering  token  of  the  vanished  hours, 

But  round  me  lie  all  desolate  and  dismembered, 
The  green  mid-forest  glades  and  vine-roofed  bowers 

Where  peace  like  a  sweet  presence  held  her  sway; 

Nothing  remains  but  ruin  and  decay. 


DECEMBER— AN  ELEGY.  87 

I  loiter  by  the  ivy-mantled  wall 

Where  cling  the  shattered  nests  upon  the  bough, 
To  hear  one  faint  and  farewell  echo  fall 

Of  all  the  music  that  is  silent  now  ; 
In  vain  ;  the  sere  grass  shivers  on  the  hill, 
The  rushes  moan  beside  the  frozen  rill. 

I  feel  like  one  in  lonely  age  returning 

To  seek  repose  in  haunts  of  happier  years, 

Who  stands  and  gazes  round  him,  vainly  yearning 
For  one  dear  landmark  that  his  memory  bears  ; 

Till  from  his  revery  by  some  rude  hand  shaken, 

He  starts  and  wakes  and  finds  himself  forsaken. 


88  SONG. 


SONG. 

WHEN  all  is  said  and  sung,  what  is  the  sum  ? 

Love,  only  love. 

What  brightest  dream  hath  youth  of  years  to  come? 
What  retrospect  turn  dim  eyes  latest  from  ? 

Love,  only  love. 

What  word  sounds  sweetest  in  the  poet's  rhyme  ? 

Love,  only  love. 

What  tales  first  told  in  some  forgotten  clime, 
From  heart  to  heart,  throb  through  the  lapse  of  time  ? 

Love,  only  love. 

The  guide-star  of  the  soul's  divine  endeavor, 

Love,  only  love. 

The  bond  of  lives  which  death  cannot  dissever, 
The  litany  the  seraphs  sing  forever — 

Love,  only  love. 


SONG.— LOVE1  S  LANGUAGE.  89 


SONG.— LOVE'S  LANGUAGE. 

LOVE'S  pleadings  will  be  heard  though  lips  be  still, 
In  fluttering  breaths  that  quicken  into  sighs, 

In  timid  hands  that  touch  and  cling  and  thrill, 
And  in  the  dear  confession  of  the  eyes ; 

Yes,  very  silence  has  a  voice  of  prayer 

More  sweet  than  any  old  Proven9al  air. 

As  when  beside  a  viol  lying  mute, 

Strong  chords  are  struck  until  it  seems  to  wake 
And  give  an  answering  murmur  to  the  lute, 

So  heart  will  throb  to  heart  for  love's  sweet  sake, 
And  chant  in  faint,  delicious  harmonies 
The  rapturous  passion-song  that  never  dies. 

How  dim  on  sculptured  shafts  remains  the  trace 
Of  stately  idioms  syllabled  no  more, 

While  ever  in  divine,  perennial  grace, 
Endures  the  nameless  unrecorded  lore, 

Whereby  in  all  the  ages  passed  away 

Love  made  its  mute  petition,  as  to-day. 


THE  APPEAL. 


THE  APPEAL. 

COLD,  bitter  cold  beneath  the  wild  March  moon, 
The  winter  snow  lies  on  my  frozen  breast ; 

And  o'er  my  head  the  cypress  branches  croon 
A  sad  and  ceaseless  dirge,  and  break  my  rest 

I  hear  the  bell  chime  in  the  dark  church  tower, 
The  rising-  wind,  a  passer's  hasty  tread  ; 

But  no  voice  wakes  the  silence,  hour  by  hour, 
Among  the  uncompanionable  dead. 

Perchance  they  lie  in  "deep,  unconscious  calm, 
Regretting  nothing  in  the  world  above ; 

Alasl  for  me,  it  has  not  lost  its  charm  ; 

There  is  no  peace  where  thou  art  not,  my  love. 

Oh,  bid  me  come  to  thee  and  I  will  rise 
From  my  unquiet  couch  and  steal  to  thine, 

And  touch  thy  cheek  and  kiss  thy  sleeping  eyes 
And  clasp  thee  as  of  old,  till  morning  shine  ! 

And  I  will  murmur  in  thy  drowsy  ears 
Sweet  utterances  of  love  and  olden  song, 

Till  thou  shalt  half  awake  in  blissful  tears, 

And  cry  "My  love,  why  hast  thou  staid  so  long  ? ' 


RECOMPENSE. 


RECOMPENSE. 

TO  PERCY  BYSSHE  SHELLEY. 

14  Oh,  smile  among  the  shades  for  this  is  fame!" 

— Keats' s  Sonnet  to  Burns. 

ONLY  these  tears  !  Not  bitter  drops  like  those 
Which  from  thy  lacerated  heart  were  shed, 

Mixed  with  the  blood  of  thy  Promethean  throes ; 
But  those  we  weep  for  the  beloved  dead, 

When  time  has  calmed  and  purified  the  pain 

And  melancholy  peace  has  come  again. 

Only  these  tears,  for  that  divinest  prize 

Which  thou  with  sacrifice  sublime  didst  win  ; 

The  angel  at  the  gates  of  Paradise 

Scorches  the  hearts  of  those  who  venture  in, 

To  bring  again  into  the  world,  a  glance 

Of  its  lost  happiness  and  radiance. 

Beauty  is  born  with  travail ;  the  young  Spring 
Blooms  on  the  bosom  of  a  Summer  dead  ; 

The  splendors  of  the  Autumn  languishing 
Are  nature's  dying  hues  of  gold  and  red  ; 


92  RECOMPENSE. 

The  strife,  the  sorrow,  the  neglect,  the  wrong1, 
Are  changed  within  the  Poet's  soul  to  song. 

Oh  thou,  of  dreamers  brightest,  and  of  men 
Most  gentle  and  most  loving,  yet  least  loved  ! 

Is  there  no  recompense  of  word  or  pen, 

No  high  revenge  thou  mightest  have  approved, 

For  all  the  scorn,  the  sorrow  and  the  shame  ? 

Only  these  tears  1 — Oh  Poet,  this  is  fame  ! 


CONTRASTS.  93 


CONTRASTS. 

IN  this  dark  dwelling  sits  the  spectre  Death, 
Watching  a  still,  cold  face  with  stirless  eyes  ; 

Yonder  the  new-born  draws  his  first  sharp  breath, 
The  while  the  sweet,  white  mother  smiling  lies  ; 

There  shine  the  festal  lights,  the  fleet  foot  flies 
To  rythmic  measures,  while  the  joyous  strain 
Throbs  with  the  fever  in  the  sick  man's  brain. 


94  TO  AN  EAGLE. 


TO  AN  EAGLE. 

ON  me  the  sun  has  set,  the  lowlands  lie 

Dim  in  the  purple  folds  of  early  night ; 
But  thou,  gray  cruiser  of  the  chartless  sky  ! 

Dost  steer  thy  slow,  undeviating  flight 

Full  in  the  sun's  unclouded  glare. 
The  world  is  bright  around  thee,  thy  strong  breast 

Parts  flashing  streams  of  keen,  ethereal  fire  ; 
Aslant  the  ardent  splendors  of  the  West, 

On  still,  curved  vans  thou  mountest  ever  higher, 
Through  scintillating  zones  of  air. 

From  what  far  quest  through  the  white  gates  of  Morn, 

Beyond  the  peopled  East,  returnest  thou  ? 
Toward  what  sheer,  solitary  mountain  bourn 

In  the  primeval  wild,  art  voyaging  now  ? 

Thou  haunter  of  unbarriered  space  ! 
I  watch  thee  soaring  up  the  steeps  of  light, 

Half  doubting  thou  art  aught  of  mortal  birth, 
Foredoomed  to  hunger,  weariness  and  blight 

And  wintry  change  of  this  controlling  earth, 
Like  our  slow-footed,  wingless  race. 


TO  AN  EAGLE. 

Aloof  in  lone,  aerial  equipoise, 

The  roar  of  inextinguishable  strife 
Melts  round  thee  like  a  faint,  unmeaning  voice, 

And  to  thy  sight  the  myriad  maze  of  life 

Is  but  a  blurred,  phantasmal  scene. 
Away,  strong  soul  !  thou  leaves!  Time  and  Death, 

Dishevelled  Grief  and  hollow-chested  Care 
To  crawl  the  dim,  abysmal  world  beneath, 

Whilst  thou  in  deeps  of  golden  dusk,  dost  fare 
Far  through  the  measureless  serene. 


95 


96 


TOIL. 


TOIL. 

IT  is  enough  !  here  will  I  lay  me  down  ; 

Here  on  the  hard  earth's  breast,  where  all  day  long 

I  labor,  I  the  heir  unto  a  crown, 

To  whom  fair,  fruitful  fields  of  right  belong, 

And  easeful  hours  achieved  of  no  man's  wrong. 

It  is  enough  !  if  toil  be  life's  one  law 
'Twere  wiser  then,  to  break  the  law  and  die. 
What  gain  by  patience  ?  bricks  without  the  straw, 
An  endless  tale,  until  the  end  draws  nigh, 
Then  like  King  ^Harold,  seven  feet  where  to  lie. 


SNOW  SORCERY. 


97 


SNOW  SORCERY. 

THE  spirits  of  the  North  were  out  last  night, 
Weaving  their  wizard  spells  on  plain  and  hill ; 

The  moon  arose  and  set  and  gave  no  light, 
The  river  freezing  in  the  reeds  grew  still  ; 

The  shuddering  stars  were  hid  behind  the  cloud, 

And  all  the  hollow  winds  were  wailing  loud. 

Where  stood  the  ricks,  three  antique  temples  stand, 
Like  those  whose  alabaster  domes  are  seen 

In  old  Benares,  or  far  Samarcand, 

Half  hid  in  groves  of  lime  and  citron  green. 

With  slender  minarets  whose  crystal  spires 

Burn  in  the  sun  with  keen,  prismatic  fires. 

The  pine  is  like  a  tall  cathedral  tower, 

With  oriels  of  withered  ivy-vines 
Entwined  in  sculptured  shapes  of  wreath  and  flower, 

Through  which  the  clear,  red  stain  of  morning  shines  ; 
And  underneath,  the  snow-draped  shrubs  and  briars 
Seem  kneeling  groups  of  silent,  white-robed  friars* 


98  SNOW  SORCERY. 

No  stone  or  bush  but  wears  a  rare  device 

Of  graceful  semblance  or  ideal  form, 
Fair  fantasy,  or  sumptuous  edifice; 

As  if  the  wayward  Ariels  of  the  storm 
Had  blent  the  magic  arts  of  Prospero 
With  their  own  whims,  and  wrought  them  in  the  snow. 


TO  A   WANDERING  DOG. 


99 


TO  A  WANDERING  DOG. 

WHAT  !  is  it  thou  that  askest  entrance  there  ? 

Who  art  thou,  friend,  and  what  would'st  thou  of  me  ? 
Food,  fire  and  shelter  from  the  bitter  air, 

A  kindly  word,  a  touch  of  sympathy  ? 

Methinks  misfortune  should  have  made  thee  wise, 
Yet  plain  it  is  thou  art  both  dull  and  blind, 

Else  never  had'st  thou  dared  in  such  a  guise, 
Ask  boon  or  grace  of  one  of  human  kind. 

Trust  me,  good  sir,  a  coat  of  napless  seam, 

A  timid  air,  an  aspect  sad  and  wan, 
Served  never  yet  to  win  the  world's  esteem  ; 

The  text  is  true  alike  for  dog  and  man. 


100  AT  DAWN. 


AT  DAWN. 

A  SUDDEN  stillness,  O,  how  deep  and  sweet ! 

A  rich,  devotional  calm  that  seems  to  rise 
In  dewy  fragrance  from  the  earth,  to  greet 

The  solemn  glory  in  the  eastern  skies  ! 

The  faint,  ethereal  harmonies  of  night, 

Tuned  to  the  dreaming  ear,  have  died  away  ; 

Nor  yet  the  timid  touch  of  early  light 

Has  waked  the  stormy  discords  of  the  day. 

Sleep  reigns.     The  spirit  of  this  holy  hour 
Soothes  all  her  weary  children  on  her  breast, 

Man,  tossing  in  his  dreams,  bird,  beast  and  flower, 
She  sprinkles  with  the  gracious  balm  of  rest 


ICE-BOUND.  101 


ICE-BOUND. 

BRIGHT  in  the  broad,  white  moon  the  river  gleams, 
Limpid  as  if  on  some  still,  August  night 

A  sudden  frost  had  stolen  upon  its  dreams 
And  crystalized  its  summer  calm  and  light 

Its  voice  is  hushed,  yet  when  the  sprays  of  snow 
Pluming  the  ozier  sheafs,  are  shaken  out, 

I  seem  to  hear  the  music  of  its  flow, 
And  the  cood  tinkle  of  the  leaping  trout 


102  ILLUSION. 


ILLUSION. 

CLOUDS  of  Autumn  sunset  glowing 
With  ruby,  gold  and  amethyst  ! 

Not  less  fair  to  me  for  knowing 
Ye  are  but  shifting  shreds  of  mist  ! 

Moon  of  Summer,  softly  streaming 
Through  my  windows  silver-clear  ! 

Not  less  tender  is  thy  seeming, 

Though  a  bleak  and  lifeless  sphere. 

Flower  that  springest  like  a  lover 
To  kiss  the  ruddy  lips  of  May  ! 

Though  thy  bloom  will  soon  be  over, 
Not  less  sweet  art  thou  to-day. 

Life  that  art  so  full  of  sorrow  ! 

We  've  laughed  together,  thou  and  I, 
Not  less  gayly,  though  to-morrow 

We  sigh,  clasp  hands  and  bid  good-by. 


INVOCATION.  103 


INVOCATION. 

TAKE  what  thou  wilt  and  leave  me  love,  oh  Fate  ! 

Take  all  I  have — friends,  honor  and  fair  fame, 
Turn  me  to  laughter  in  the  eye  of  hate, 

Clothe  me  with  scorn  and  bind  my  brow  with  shame, 
Give  me  for  bread  the  bitter  fruit  of  care, 

Give  me  to  drink  the  poison-wine  of  pain, 
Seal  me  with  sleepless  sorrow  and  despair — 

Take  all,  change  all,  oh  Fate  !  so  love  remain. 


104  OVER  THE  MOUNTAINS. 


OVER  THE  MOUNTAINS. 

"  WHAT  dream  unpillowed  thy  young  head 

At  chill  and  cheerless  break  of  day  ? 
And  where,  with  swift,  impatient  tread, 
Pursuest  thou  thy  lonely  way  ?  " 

"  See  where  the  purple  mountains  lie, 

Like  clouds  that  catch  the  rising-  sun  ; 
Behind  yon  peak  that  breasts  the  sky 
I  needs  must  be  ere  day  is  done." 

"  And  lies  thy  home  beyond  that  peak, 

In  some  wild-wooded  mountain-glen, 
And,  sick  with  absence,  dost  thou  seek 
The  sweet,  familiar  scene  again  ?" 

"  Untroubled  as  the  morning  wind 

That  drinks  the  dew  from  grass  and  tree, 
I  leave  my  father's  house  behind  ; 
The  broad,  bright  world  is  home  to  me. " 


OVER  THE  MOUNTAINS.  I 

"  Then  Fancy  hath  thee  by  the  hand, 

And  whispers  tales  of  import  sweet, 
How,  sighing  through  a  rainbow  land, 
Love  listens  for  thy  coming  feet" 

"  Twere  sweet  to  find  love  waiting  me, 

If  love  were  meek  and  came  unsought ; 
Not  mine  a  love-sick  fantasy, 
I  follow  a  sublimer  thought." 

"  Dost  dream  of  mines  and  treasures  rare, 

In  yon  recesses  buried  down, 
Or  seek  in  faery  fastness  there 
The  bitter  laurel  of  renown  ?  " 

"  Ask  me  no  more  !  I  cannot  tell 

What  thing  I  burn  to  find  or  do  ; 
I  only  know  a  wild,  wild  spell 

Compels  me  to  those  crests  of  blue. " 

"  I  warn  thee,  though  they  seem  so  near, 

It  is  a  weary  way  between  ; 
Through  woods  and  wastes  obscure  and  drear, 
And  adder-haunted  fens  unseen." 


106  OVER  THE  MOUNTAINS. 

"  A  journey  made,  a  danger  met, 

Are  tales  to  tell  when  both  are  done  ; 
There  never  was  pleasure  yet 

Worth  tasting  if  too  smoothly  won." 

"  Oh,  boy,  why  waste  the  golden  hours 

In  searching  after  fancied  sweet  ? 
Thou'lt  find  naught  sweeter  than  the  flowers, 
That  die  beneath  thy  heedless  feet." 

"Oh,  rank  of  scent  and  pale  to  sight 

The  weeds  that  haunt  this  homely  place  ! 
The  flowers  that  spring  beyond  that  height 
Must  bloom  with  a  diviner  grace. " 

"  On  some  tall  cliffs  accessless  crown 

They  mock  the  desperate  climber's  clutch, 
Or  haply,  if  he  pull  them  down, 
They  turn  to  ashes  at  his  touch. 

"  Beyond  those  hills  in  other  years, 

I,  too,  sought  wondrous  things  to  find. 
Ah  me !  I  turn  again,  with  tears, 
To  seek  the  sweets  I  left  behind." 


MUTABILITY.  107 


MUTABILITY. 

LIFE  is  a  journey  with  but  little  rest, 

A  cruising  bark  that  anchors  nowhere  long ;  >C 
A  migratory  bird  that  builds  no  nest, 

Seeking  new  haunts  on  pinions  swift  and  strong ; 
An  endless  longing  and  a  fruitless  quest. 


108  WRONGED  LOVE. 


WRONGED  LOVE. 

Who  wrongeth  love  doth  himself  grievous  wrong  ; 

For  he  hath  shut  away  the  light  of  heaven 
And  doomed  his  darkened  soul  to  wander  long 

In  nether  exile,  desolate,  unforgiven  ; 
Till  at  God's  feet,  imploring  his  release, 
Wronged  love,  all  pardoning,  shall  win  his  peace. 

Thus  in  her  low  voice  like  the  silver  chime 
Of  bells  heard  over  distant  hills  by  night, 

She  read  aloud  her  chosen  poet's  rhyme — 
How  two  of  old  found  favor  in  love's  sight ; 

And  one  was  false  and  one  with  cureless  wound, 

Closed  his  sad  eyes  in  consecrated  ground. 


RANDOM  CHORDS. 


109 


RANDOM  CHORDS. 


A  VISTA. 

THE  river  winding  onward  till  it  seems 
To  part  the  dusky  hills  on  either  side 

And  make  a  highway  to  the  land  of  dreams  ; 
Slim  elms  whose  slender  branches  arching  wide 

Enmesh  the  stars  that  shimmer  through  them  there, 

Like  gems  that  gleam  in  Berenice's  hair  ! 

DAWN  Music. 

WHEN  from  her  window-bars  the  maiden  Morn, 
Shakes  down  the  star-drops  from  her  shining  hair, 

Athwart  the  meadow  silences  is  borne 
A  golden  hint  of  music  hushed  in  air : 

Is  it  the  winding  of  Diana's  horn  ? 


r  10  RANDOM  CHORDS. 

NIGHT  SILENCE. 

Is  it  not  beautiful,  the  perfect  night  ? 

So  still  not  one  leafs  darker  side  uplifts 
Unto  the  moon  ;  nor  where  the  broken  light 

In  clear-clipped  shapes  falls  through  the  azure  rifts 
Upon  the  dew  besilvered  sward  below, 
Stirs  one  slight  stem  a  moth's  frail  wing  might  blow. 

GLOAMING. 

THE  arching  splendor,  momently  more  faint, 

Burns  round  the  cold,  white  crest  of  yonder  height, 

As  o'er  the  forehead  of  a  dying  saint 

'Tis  said  the  halo,  glimpse  of  heaven's  own  light, 

Was  seen  by  those  who  knelt  to  gaze  and  pray. 

Lo  !  gleam  by  gleam,  it  fails  and  fades  away. 

PURSUIT. 

OH  !  pilgrim  night,  art  thou  not  weary, 

Returning  on  the  self-same  way 
O'er  dusky  wold  and  woodland  dreary, 

Pursuing  still  the  flying  day  ? 


RANDOM  CHORDS.  1 1 1 

The  self-same  hill,  the  self-same  meadow, 
While  seasons  wax  and  seasons  wane, 

Grow  sad  beneath  thy  coming  shadow, 
Grow  glad  when  thou  art  gone  again. 

WINTER  BEAUTY. 

SILENCE  of  snow  and  gloom  of  frowning  skies, 
Splendor  of  death,  or  wonder  of  white  sleep, 

Cold,  stately  beauty,  perfect  marble-wise, 
Like  as  a  statue  whose  still  features  keep 

A  spectral  semblance  with  unseeing  eyes  ! 

SOLITUDE. 

A  WILD,  wind-beaten  coast  where  no  man  dwells, 
And  no  lone  sea-bird  builds  its  mateless  nest, 

Where  ever  like  the  chime  of  goblin  bells 
That  ring  some  Runic  measure  of  unrest, 

Some  weird  lament,  some  wordless  litany, 
Sounds  the  unsleeping  sea. 

A  waste  of  cloven  crag  and  wrinkled  sand, 

Wave-winnowed  miles  of  grass  and  sluggish  stream, 

Where  ever  through  the  blown  and  barren  land, 
Like  vehement,  strange  voices  in  a  dream 

That  wail  and  warn  in  muffled  monotone, 
The  wind  makes  desolate  moan. 


1 1 2  RANDOM  CHORDS. 

REVISITED. 

LAST  night  some  nameless  longing  led  me  thither, 
Some  memory  from  the  buried  years  upcast ; — 

I  wandered  idly  on,  I  knew  not  whither, 
Lost  in  the  lightless  caverns  of  the  past 

Like  hooded  friars  with  foreheads  bent  to  pray, 
Pacing  before  some  minster's  lighted  pane, 

Gray  cloud-shapes  swept  across  the  waning  day, 
With  shifting  gleams  and  sudden  gusts  of  rain. 

And  wailing  shrilly  like  a  childless  woman, 
The  bleak  wind  moaned  and  clamored  fitfully, 

And  like  the  stealthy  step  of  nothing  human, 
The  dead  leaves  softly  seemed  pursuing  me. 


RENAISSANCE.  1 13 


RENAISSANCE. 

loveliness  has  passed  away  !  "  they  cry  ; 

"  Romance  lies  dead  beside  her  broken  lyre  ; 
Beauty  has  vanished  from  the  earth  and  sky, 

The  dawn  is  cold,  the  noon  has  lost  its  fire. " 
But  to  the  blind  what  are  the  hues,  of  Spring  ? 
And  to  the  deaf  what  songs  does  Summer  sing  ? 

Nothing  has  passed  away  that  once  was  fair  ; 

The  day  wanes  through  the  golden  gates  of  even  ; 
The  leaves  have  voices  in  the  quiet  air  ; 

The  stars  burn  bright  upon  the  brow  of  heaven  ; 
The  woods  are  loud  with  notes  as  rich  and  clear 
As  ever  charmed  Arcadian  shepherd's  ear. 

No,  Beauty  is  not  lost ;  and  those  who  will 
May  find  her  sleeping  in  a  wayside  flower, 

Or  throned  upon  some  solitary  hill, 

Robed  in  the  symbols  of  her  ancient  power. 

But  reverent  pilgrims  throng  her  shrines  no  more ; 

Her  faithless  priesthood  have  forgot  her  lore. 


JI4  RENAISSANCE. 

Our  lines  are  cast  upon  a  barren  time ; 

Cold  doubt  congeals  the  fervid  heart  of  youth  ; 
The  greed  of  gain  and  power  demeans  our  prime  ; 

And  love  of  self  usurps  the  love  of  truth. 
Faint  are  the  sounds  of  song  ;  the  poet's  lay 
Is  still  the  music  of  his  race  and  day. 

But  'neath  December's  frozen  meadows  lie 
The  folded  splendors  of  the  unborn  May. 

The  germ  of  beauty  that  can  never  die 

May  slumber  while  the  cold  years  lapse  away ; 

But,  soon  or  late,  within  the  common  heart, 

Shall  wake  to  purer  faith  and  loftier  art. 


SONG.  II5 


SONG. 

How  many  lips  have  uttered  one  sweet  word — 

Ever  the  sweetest  word  in  any  tongue  ! 
How  many  listening  hearts  have  wildly  stirred, 

While  burning  blushes  to  the  soft  cheeks  sprung, 
And  dear  eyes,  deepening  with  a  light  divine, 
Were  lifted  up,  as  thine  are  now  to  mine  ! 

How  oft  the  night,  with  silence  and  perfume, 

Has  hushed  the  world  that  heart  might  speak  to  heart, 

And  make  in  each  dim  haunt  of  leafy  gloom 

A  trysting  place  where  love  might  meet  and  part, 

And  kisses  fall  unseen  on  lips  and  brow, 

As  on  thine,  sweet !  my  kisses  linger  now  ! 


II 6  LO  V&S  D  WELLING-PLA  CE. 


LOVE'S  DWELLING-PLACE. 

WHERE  dwelleth  Love  ?  oh,  tell  me  where  ! 
In  some  dim  region  of  delight, 

Beyond  the  day  spring's  golden  bars, 
Above  the  uttermost  bright  stars, 
Far  in  the  azure  Infinite  ? 
Oh,  no  !  not  there. 

Is  it  in  lands  the  poets  know, 
Where  lovely  shapes  go  up  and  down 

Through  vaulted  glooms  and  flickering  gleams, 
In  the  pale,  pictured  hall  of  dreams, 
To  fairy  music,  faintly  blown  ? 
Oh,  no  !  not  so. 

Dwelt  she  in  happy  Arcady, 
With  the  Saturnian  race  of  men, 

Ere  yet  with  wisdom,  war  and  gold, 
The  human  heart  grew  sad  and  cold, 
Then  fled  she  back  to  heaven  again  ? 
Not  fled  is  she. 


LOVE'S  DWELLING-PLACE.  j  x ? 

Or  sole  in  Languedoc  the  fair, 
In  brave,  bright  days  of  chivalry, 
When  good  knights  fought  on  field  and  tower, 
And  troubadours,  in  court  and  bower, 
Sang  lays  of  Belle  Dame  Sans  Merci  ? 
Not  only  there. 

Or  slumbers  she  in  palmy  dells 
Of  some  lone,  undiscovered  isle, 
With  folded  hands  and  lidded  eyes, 
Beneath  dusk,  leaf-woven  canopies 
That  shed  soft  dew  of  sound  the  while  ? 
Not  there  she  dwells. 

Ah,  no  !  hers  is  no  hidden  shrine  ; 

She  bides  in  ways  of  stress  and  strife  ; 
Her  lips  are  on  the  brow  of  pain, 
Her  strong  hand  lightens  labor's  chain,. 
She  makes  of  this  hard,  bitter  life 
A  thing  divine. 

The  wrongs  of  change,  the  wounds  of  time, 
The  world's  disdain,  she  will  endure  ; 
She  is  not  bribed  by  gold  or  fame, 


j  18  LOVERS  D WELLIXG-PLA CE. 

Nor  daunted  by  the  taint  of  shame  ; 
Whate'er  betide  she  standeth  sure, 
With  trust  sublime. 

She  comes  in  various  disguise 
Of  rustic  garb  or  royal  grace, 

But  whatso  be  her  name  or  state, 
Thy  heart  will  know  her,  soon  or  late, 
When  she  unveils  her  splendid  face 
And  glowing  eyes. 


IN  CAPTIVITY. 


IN  CAPTIVITY. 

UPON  a  naked  islet  in  the  sea — 

To  me  a  shoreless  sea — 

I  stand  and  watch  the  waves  roll  on  the  sands, 
For  some  chance  waif  adrift  from  other  lands 

Below  the  sloping  sky. 

The  jealous  sea  derides  me  with  its  voice — 

Its  secret,  sneering  voice ; 
In  vain  I  seek  along  the  barren  shore 
The  frailest  boat,  or  plank,  or  splintered  oar, 

To  brave  its  tyrant  might. 

Fast  on  this  little  birthright  of  my  race — 

Ah  me  !  a  short-lived  race  ! 
Is  it  decreed  that  I  shall  never  see 
What  lies  beyond  my  narrow  boundary, 

Before  God  bids  me  die  ? 


j  20  IN  CAPTIVITY. 

The  day  holds  fast  its  secret  from  my  quest — 

My  restless,  burning  quest  ; 
The  dusk,  mysterious  dawn  broods  on  the  sea  ; 
The  sun  wheels  up  in  flaming  majesty, 

And  blinds  my  shrinking  sight. 

With  gaze  upstrained  I  haunt  the  depth  of  stars — 

The  mute,  impassive  stars  ; 
And  like  a  hot  young  neophyte,  I  try 
To  penetrate  with  my  bewildered  eye 

The  Isis  veil  of  night. 

Lost  and  amazed,  in  deepest  gloom  I  grope — 

With  outstretched  hands  I  grope  — 
Around  the  circle  of  a  single  day  ; 
The  infinite  of  years  yawns  in  my  way, 
And  swallows  up  my  cry. 


AT  THE  MERMAID  INN.  121 


AT  THE  MERMAID  INN. 


AT  table,  yonder,  sits  the  man  we  seek, 
Beside  the  ingle,  where  the  crimson  flare 

Reveals  him  through  the  eddying  tavern  reek, 
Reclining  easeful  in  his  leathern  chair  ; 

In  russet  doublet,  bearded  and  benign, 

He  looks  a  worthy  burgher  at  his  wine. 

Even  so  ;  but  when  thy  veins  ran  fire  to-night, 
Thy  hand  crept  knotted  to  thy  sword-hilt  there, 

And  through  all  moods  of  madness  and  delight 
Thy  soul  was  hurried  headlong,  unaware, 

It  seemed  the  genius  of  the  scene  should  be 

Some  radiant  shape,  brow-bound  with  majesty. 

And  lo  !  a  man  unsingled  from  the  crowd 
By  quick  recognizance  of  reverent  eyes, 

A  dim,  inobvious  presence,  kindly-browed, 
That  sits  apart,  observant,  thoughtful- wise, 

Weaving — who  knows  ? — what  wondrous  woof  of  song, 

What  other  Hamlet,  from  the  shifting  throng. 


122  AT  THE  MERMAID  INN. 

A  pale,  plain-favored  face,  the  smile  whereof 
Is  beautiful ;  the  eyes  gray,  changeful,  bright, 

Low-lidded  now,  and  luminous  as  love  ; 
Anon  soul-searching,  ominous  as  night, 

Seer-like,  inscrutable,  revealing  deeps 

Wherein  a  mighty  spirit  wakes  or  sleeps. 

Here,  where  my  outstretched  hand  might  touch  his  arm, 

I  gaze  upon  that  mild  and  lofty  mien, 
With  that  deep  awe  and  unexpressive  charm 

I  feel  in  wide  sea-solitudes  serene  ; 
Or  on  some  immemorial  mountain's  crest — 
Eternity  unveiled  and  manifest. 

For  he  hath  wrought  with  nature  and  made  known 

The  marvel  and  the  majesty  of  life  ; 
Translating  from  the  pages  of  his  own 

The  mighty  heart  of  man,  the  stress  and  strife, 
The  pain,  the  passion,  and  the  bitter  leaven, 
The  cares  that  quell,  the  dreams  that  soar  to  heaven. 

So,  whatsoever  time  shall  make  or  mar, 

Or  fate  decree  of  benison  or  blame, 
This  poet-player,  like  a  wondrous  star, 

Shall  shed  the  solemn  splendor  of  his  fame, 
Wide  as  the  world,  while  beauty  has  a  shrine, 
While  youth  has  hope,  and  love  is  yet  divine.  - 


THE  SONG  OF  THE  SCYTHE.         123 


THE  SONG  OF  THE  SCYTHE. 

AMID  the  August  noontide  white  and  warm, 
A  rythmic  sound,  sweet  as  a  distant  chime, 

Floats  from  the  meadows  steeped  in  sultry  calm, 
Blent  with  the  breath  of  clover-bloom  and  thyme  ; 

As  if  the  scent  of  leaf  and  flower  might  be 

An  undertone  of  dreamy  melody. 

Like  tuneful  voices  in  a  tongue  unknown, 
Chanting  some  old  Saturnian  harmony, 

Or  Pan-pipes  in  dark  forest  coverts  blown, 
To  tempt  the  timid  Dryad  from  her  tree, 

The  golden,  molten  measures  throb  and  flow 

Where  sunburned  reapers  swing  the  scythe  arow. 

Sweet  pastoral,  that  with  a  single  note 

Hymneth  the  primal  poetry  of  earth  ! 
Thine  are  the  songs  of  summer  days  remote, 

Old  harvest-homes  and  boisterous  village  mirth, 
The  country  dance  upon  the  threshing-floor, 
The  light  kiss  stolen  from  lips  that  laugh  no  more. 


124         THE  SONG  OF  THE  SCYTHE. 

And  lo  !  yon  priests  of  Ceres  crowned  with  wheat, 
Brown,  lusty  youths  that  draw  the  laden  wain, 

Fair  girls  with  gleaming  limbs  and  naked  feet, 
And  all  the  tumult  of  the  joyous  train  ! 

And  lo  !  where  in  the  beechen  shadows  deep, 

Sweet  Amaryllis  sits  among  her  sheep  ! 


JUNE  DAYS.  125 


JUNE  DAYS. 

WANE  on,  delicious  days  of  shower  and  shine, 

Cool,  cloudy  morns,  and  noontides  white  and  warm, 

And  eves  that  melt  in  azure  hyaline — 

Wane  to  midsummer's  long,  Lethean  calm ! 

For  all  the  woods  are  shrill  with  stress  of  song, 
Where  soft  wings  flutter  down  to  new-built  nests, 

And  turbulent  sweet  sounds  are  heard  day-long, 
As  of  innumerable  marriage-feasts. 

The  flame  of  flowers  is  bright  along  the  plain, 
The  hills  are  dim  beneath  pale,  brooding  skies ; 

And,  like  a  kiss  that  thrills  through  every  vein, 
The  warm  wind,  odor-laden,  stirs  and  sighs, 

Murmuring  like  music  heard  afar  by  night, 

From  boats  becalmed  on  star-illumined  streams  ; 

Sad  as  the  memory  of  a  lost  delight, 

Sweet  as  the  voices  that  are  heard  in  dreams. 


126  JUNE  DAYS. 

Wane,  siren  days,  and  break  the  spell  that  wrings 
The  burdened  breast  with  undefined  regret, 

Wayward  desires,  and  vain  imaginings, 
The  nameless  longing,  and  the  idle  fret. 

Wane  on  !  ye  wake  the  love  that  tempts  and  flies  ; 

And  where  love  is,  thence  peace  departs  full  soon  ; 
But,  ah,  how  sweet  love  is,  e'en  though  it  dies 

With  thy  last  roses,  O  enchantress  June  I 


MEMORY.  127 


MEMORY. 

WHAT  we  miscall  our  life  is  Memory  : 
We  walk  upon  a  narrow  path  between 
Two  gulfs — what  is  to  be,  and  what  has  been, 
Led  by  a  guide  whose  name  is  Destiny  ; 
Beyond  is  sightless  gloom  and  mystery, 
From  whose  unfathomable  depths  we  glean 
Chaotic  hopes  and  terrors,  dimly  seen 
Reflections  of  a  past  reality. 
Behind,  pursuing  through  the  twilight  haze, 
The  phantom  people  of  the  past  appear; 
Hope,  happiness  and  sorrow,  fruitless  strife, 
And  all  the  loved  and  lost  of  other  days  ; 
They  crowd  upon  us  closer  year  by  year, 
Till  we  as  phantoms  haunt  some  other  life, 


128  TO  A  B  UTTERFL  Y. 


TO  A  BUTTERFLY. 

THROUGH  August  shine  and  shadow  softly  borne, 
Silent  in  curves  of  slow,  uncertain  flight, 

Far  o'er  the  meadows  and  the  ripening  corn, 

Thou  dippest  down  through  shimmering  waves  of  light 
To  flowery  islands  odorous  and  bright. 

No  woven  fabric  ever  caught  such  dyes, 
No  rare,  embroidered  cymar,  half  unrolled 

To  tempt  a  Turkish  favorite's  sated  eyes, 
With  fitful  splendors  in  each  luminous  fold 
Of  lucid  sapphire,  pearl  and  frosted  gold. 

Thou  knowest  not  of  cold  and  cloudy  skies 
The  naked  hedge,  the  sere  and  sighing  wood  ; 

Thou  livest  not  on  while  all  around  thee  dies, 
The  last,  faint  loiterer  of  thy  bright  brood 
Forgotten  in  some  icy  solitude. 

Bright  child  of  summer !  who  has  seen  in  tliee 
The  mournful  type  of  Beauty's  swift  decay  ? 

Rather  the  happy  symbol  shouldst  thou  be 
Of  life  that  fills  a  full  and  joyous  day, 
Then,  ere  the  winter  chills  it,  fades  away. 


AT  SUNRISE*  J2g 


AT    SUNRISE. 

IT  is  the  last  dark  hour,  and  from,  their  cars, 
That  wheel  them  down  through  glimmering  voids  of 
light, 

Leaning  reluctantly,  the  hearkening  stars 
Hear  the  faint,  final  music  of  the  night 

Blend  with  the  far,  sweet  voice  of  coming  day, 

And  with  the  moon,  low  riding,  wane  away. 

Like  some  soft-footed  maiden,  bearing  high 

A  silver  lamp  above  her  timorous  head, 
The  dawn  mounts  up  the  stairways  of  the  sky, 

Flushing  the  ashen  east  with  lambent  red, 
Till  from  her  topmost  tower  she  looketh  down, 
Smiling  through  cloudy  tresses  wildly  blown. 

The  world  awakens  ;  hark,  from  glen  and  copse, 

Music  and  many  voices  of  delight ! 
The  splendor  on  the  purple  mountain  tops 

Descends,  and  all  the  summer  plains  are  bright ; 
And  all  the  luminous,  pure  sky  above 
Is  calm  and  tender  as  the  smile  of  love. 


1 3  O  ITALIAN  DREAMS. 


ITALIAN  DREAMS. 

O  ITALY  !  thou  givest  me  no  rest, 

But  ever,  like  the  thoughts  of  absent  love, 

Thou  stirrest  a  burning  fever  in  my  breast, 
A  mad  desire  to  see  thee  and  to  prove 

Thou  art  more  fair  than  my  resplendent  dream  ; 
For  well  I  wot  this  cold,  ungracious  clime 
Has  neither  old  romance,  nor  scene,  nor  time 

Whereby  to  picture  forth  how  thou  dost  seem. 

Not  that  I  love  my  native  land  the  less  ; 

She  is  my  mother,  passionless  but  kind  ; 
And,  mayhap,  sick  with  alien  loneliness, 

I  might  turn  looks  of  tenderness  behind, 
And  yearn  once  more  to  see  her  cold  blue  skies, 

Her  solemn  hills,  uncastled  and  unsung ; 

To  hear  again  the  tuneless  Saxon  tongue, 
And  reunite  too  rudely  severed  ties. 


ITALIAN  DREAMS.  1 3 1 

But  Italy  !  across  the  pathless  sea, 

O'er  whose  waste  wistfully  I  gaze  afar, 

I  hear  thy  voice  forever  calling  me, 
As  love's  voice  calls  beneath  the  evening  star  ; 

I  hear  from  dim,  old  spires  the  vesper  bell, 
The  plash  of  tideless  waves  on  Bail's  shore, 
And  from  the  Arno,  darkness  brooding  o'er, 

The  strains  of  some  impassioned  ritornelle. 

Young  Keats,  asleep  beside  the  Roman  wall  ! 

I  deem  not  thine  a  destiny  for  tears  ; 
To  tread  the  holy  ground  where  thou  didst  fall, 

I  too  would  turn  the  brief  page  of  my  years. 
And  Shelley,  no  regret  have  I  for  thee  ! 

Thy  heart  lies  in  the  silent  Cistian  grove 

And  mingles  with  the  soil  which  thou  didst  love, 
Where  my  heart  is,  though  I  may  never  be. 


132 


THE  FLOWER  OF  LOVE. 


THE  FLOWER  OF  LOVE. 

O  PLUCK  the  blossom  in  its  crimson  prime, 

Ere  yet  one  tender  hue  has  passed  away  ! 
So  shall  it  never  know  the  winter  time, 

Sere  blight  of  frost,  or  livid,  slow  decay. 
While  now  thou  fold'st  me  to  thy  fluttering  breast, 

In  the  sweet  tremor  of  thy  love  and  shame, 
And  like  a  stock-dove  cooing  on  its  nest, 

Thou  murmurest  low  the  accents  of  my  name  ; 
While  now  the  sense  of  laboring  time  is  gone — 

Swooned  in  the  sea,  lost,  buried  anywhere — 
While  all  I  heed  of  heaven  or  world  alone, 

Lies  in  thine  arms,  pavilioned  by  thy  hair, 
O  would  that  thou  couldst  kiss  away  my  breath, 
And  love  sink  down  deliciously  to  death. 


TRUTH.  133 


TRUTH. 

tc  Nothing  is  more  wretched  than  a  man  who  traverses  everything  in  a  round  and 
pries  into  the  things  beneath  the  earth." — Marcus  Antonius,  quoted  from  Pindar. 

THE  world  is  beautiful  and  all  the  brood 

It  nurses  on  its  mother-breast,  of  things 

That  move  and  know  and  forms  that  seem  to  be 

But  for  the  sake  of  loveliness  alone. 

Than  this,  what  deeper  knowledge  need  there  be 

To  round  the  sum  of  all-desired  content? 

O  hapless  he,  who  seeks  by  devious  ways, 

In  mines  and  deep-sea  caverns,  and  the  vault 

Where  swing  those  pendulums  of  Time,  the  stars, 

Or  in  the  corridors  of  his  own  brain, 

The  ultimate  and  perfect  truth,  which  found 

Might  prove  the  secret  of  pure  happiness  ! 

He  is  a  snail  that  crawls  a  summer  day 

Beside  a  brook,  where  every  leaf  and  stone 

Is  but  a  bar  to  his  obscure  advance. 

His  eyes  and  thoughts  take  note  of  littleness; 

And  not  for  him  the  glory  of  the  sky, 

Where  burns  the  sun,  nor  the  near  perfect  scene 

Of  woods  and  streams  and  hills  that  spreads  around. 


I34  TRUTH. 

Once  I  had  zeal  to  learn  the  ways  of  God ; 

0  I  did  yearn  to  read,  with  these  dim  eyes, 
The  dark  and  incommunicative  past, 

On  stony  pages  of  the  underworld, 

Or  in  the  wheeling  maze  of  distant  spheres  ; 

And  to  forecast  the  destined  path  which  I 

And  all  my  momentary  kind  should  tread ! 

Some  gleams  misled  me  ;  I  did  hope  to  hold 

Within  the  compass  of  my  little  brain, 

The  scope  and  bulk  of  all  eternity. 

And  as  I  walked  the  darkness  grew  apace, 

And  all  things  looming  out  of  shadow,  seemed 

The  monstrous  part  of  some  more  monstrous  whole. 

And  then  came  madness — madness  of  despair  ; 

1  lifted  up  my  hands  and  cried  aloud, 

"  Lo  !  this  is  all !  there  is  no  truth  but  this  !  " 
And  pausing  there,  I  sat  me  down  and  wept 

Then  death  became  a  horror  and  a  crime, 

And  life  the  infinite  of  nothingness  ; 

And  all  the  ills  of  life  the  torture  play, 

Remorseless,  of  sarcastic  destiny  ; 

WThile  thus  I  sat  in  bitterness  profound, 

Lo  !  through  the  midnight  gloom  above  my  head 


TRUTH.  135 

A  single  star  shone  out,  a  small  clear  light 
That  tranced  my  dreary  gaze  and  held  it  fast, 
Till  in  my  soul,  I  knew  not  why,  nor  know, 
As  on  its  beam  a  still,  sweet  ray  of  peace 
Was  born,  and  lighting  all  my  inner  night, 
Did  banish  my  despair  with  rich  content. 
Then  back  I  fared,  till  on  the  noonday  walk 
Of  common  life  I  viewed  the  outer  world 
With  clearer  eyes  that  saw  and  loved  it  all. 

And  now  the  sweet  uprising  of  the  dawn, 

The  mellow  noon  with  all  its  insect  joy, 

The  blossom-tinted  sunset  and  the  night 

With  its  mysterious  ecstacy  of  stars  ; 

The  clouds,  the  storms  and  winter's  darkest  frown, 

The  hills  and  hollow  places  and  the  streams, 

The  face  of  man,  these  seem  the  perfect  truth — 

These  do  I  deem  the  all-sufficient  cause — 

If  cause  need  be — and  the  accomplished  end. 


136  THE  HEIR. 


THE  HEIR. 

THE  world  awaits  :     When  shall  there  come  again 
The  nameless  heir  to  an  imperial  throne, 

From  thronged  metropolis  or  mountain  glen, 
To  prove  his  royal  blood  and  claim  his  own — 

The  boundless  empire  of  the  hearts  of  men  ? 
Is  he  among  us  now,  uncrowned,  unknown, — 

Perchance  his  birth-right  self-unrecognized — 

A  king  beneath  a  peasant's  garb  disguised  ? 


Doubt  not ;  for  while  the  fair  young  mother  Spring 
Comes  lapping  in  her  robe  half-opened  flowers, 

And  birds  that  seek  old  haunts  on  eager  wing  ; 
While  buxom  Summer  dozes  through  bright  hours, 

Unwaked  by  insect  pipe  or  scythe's  far  ring  ; 

While  auburn  Autumn  browns  the  forest  bowers, 

And  Winter  bellows  o'er  the  wind-swept  hill, 

One  favored  son  is  born  to  Nature  still. 


THE  HEIR.  !^ 

The  crown  is  his  whose  life  is  set  apart, 

Not  by  strange  moods  or  cloudy  wanderings, 

But  by  the  clear  faith  of  a  fervent  heart, 
To  pierce  the  clotted  crust  of  common  things. 

And  with  the  passion  of  an  untaught  art — 

As  some  joy-raptured  bird  leaps  up  and  sings — 

Translate  in  music  to  the  voiceless  throng 

The  loveliness  which  has  no  name  but  Song. 


138  FIRESIDE  SONG. 


FIRESIDE  SONG. 

DRAW  close  the  curtain  on  the  streaming  pane ! 

Our  hearts  are  heavy  with  the  cheerless  night ; 
Shut  out  the  tumult  of  the  wind  and  rain, 

Shut  out  the  cold  and  dark,  shut  in  the  light ! 

See,  love,  the  gracious  glow  on  wall  and  floor  ! 

Here,  at  the  noon-mark  of  these  golden  gleams, 
We  may  forget  the  winter  out  of  door, 

And  lose  ourselves  in  pleasant  summer  dreams. 

Here,  islanded  in  calm,  we  may  forget 
The  outer  life  of  stormy  cares  and  aims  ; 

And  all  that  makes  its  struggle  and  regret 
May  be  to  us  no  more  than  empty  names. 

Shut  out  the  bleak  world  and  the  troubled  sky  ! 

Shut  in  our  love,  our  loneliness  and  peace  ! 
Though  winter  storms  be  out  and  winds  be  high, 

The  summer  in  our  hearts  need  never  cease. 


THE  FACE  OF  LOVE.  139 


THE  FACE  OF  LOVE. 

BUT  once  beheld  by  any  man,  no  more  ; 

And  then  with  such  wild  tumult  in  his  brain 
He  may  not  recollect  the  look  it  wore, 

Or  if  'twas  pleasure  that  he  felt,  or  pain, 
When  those  strange  eyes  sent  fire  to  his  heart's  core. 

But  who  can  grasp  the  maze  of  sad  delight 
That  music  weaves,  its  memory  dying  never  ? 

And  who  can  read  the  Face  of  Love  aright, 
With  all  its  mystic  meanings,  shifting  ever, 

That  stir  life's  deepest  springs,  yet  cheat  the  sight? 

A  face  of  godlike  glory,  such  as  men 

Might  well  misdeem  the  majesty  of  heaven, 

But  that  there  ever  comes  and  goes  again — 

Like  clouds  across  the  noonday  brilliance  driven — 

A  mien  that  makes  it  wholly  human  then. 


140  THE  FACE  OF  LOVE. 

Full-lipped  as  Orient  maidens,  there  may  play 
The  dimpled  meaning  that  has  shaken  thrones 

And  swept  a  nation's  boundaries  away  ; 
And  then  a  quiver,  as  of  voiceless  groans, 

And  all  the  face  looks  tragic,  old  and  gray. 

At  times  a  sad,  mysterious  face,  that  seems 
With  startled  eyes  to  watch  for  coming  ill ; 

Yet  ever  and  anon  across  it  gleams 

A  smile,  that,  passing,  leaves  it  cold  and  still, 

Enwrapped  in  unimaginable  dreams. 


PERENNIAL  BEAUTY.  I4I 


PERENNIAL  BEAUTY. 

EVER  the  spring  returns  with  skies  serene, 

And  balmy  breath  of  infant  buds  and  flowers  ; 

Ever  the  hills  renew  their  primal  green, 

And  melodies  that  gladdened  earth's  first  hours 

And  heard  again  in  many  a  hazel  screen. 

Warm  hearts  turn  cold,  quick  pulses  cease  to  beat, 
And  love  grows  languid  in  the  lapse  of  time  ; 

But  beauty  still  tempts  youth's  pursuing  feet, 

Bright  eyes  are  endless  themes  for  passioned  rhyme, 

And  lovers'  vows  will  be  forever  sweet. 

Great  souls  have  died  for  truth  and  left  their  fame 

To  be  the  watchword  of  another  age  ; 
But  virtue,  justice,  courage,  and  high  aim 

Descend  through  time,  a  common  heritage, 
And  heroes  live  to-day  in  all  but  name. 

Years  wax  and  wane,  the  good  and  true  remain  ; 

How  sweet  love  is  mine  own  heart  telleth  me. 
Mine  eyes  have  seen  the  summer  in  the  plain, 

And  in  the  crowded  street,  unwittingly, 
I  may  have  passed  a  martyr  in  his  pain. 


I42  THE  SISTERS. 


THE  SISTERS. 

"  O  LIFE  !  hast  thou  misled  me  with  thy  smiles  ?  " 

I  said,  "  Are  all  thy  gifts  so  vain — 
Mirages  of  the  fabled  Happy  Isles, 

Hung  over  wide,  bleak  seas  of  pain  ? 
Unfathomable  Doom  !  if  in  thy  deeps, 

Some  compensating  secret  sleeps, 

Oh,  let  it  not  be  wholly  lost ; 
Give  me  to  see  and  know  thine  uttermost ! " 

Then  came  two  Spirits,  like  in  form  and  face — 
So  very  like  that  one  might  seem 

The  younger  sister  with  a  fresher  grace, 

And  eyes  of  brighter  hue  and  gleam  ; 

And  one  with  matron  movement,  grave  and  slow, 
Pale,  beautiful,  unsmiling  brow, 
And  lips  that  trembled  half  apart, 

As  if  with  still,  sad  tenderness  of  heart. 

"  Mysterious  Sisters,  who  are  ye  ?  "  I  cried. 
"  Ye  came  responsive  to  no  call !  " 


THE  SISTERS.  r 

"  Know'st  thou  not  me  ? "  the  elder  one  replied ; 

"  My  name  is  Death,  the  all-in-all. 
I  am  the  uttermost,  the  solace  sweet 

For  aching  hearts  and  weary  feet  ; 
Come  thou  to  me,  upon  this  breast, 
Beloved,  find  life's  golden  secret,  Rest !  " 

" Not  so,"  the  other  cried,  "oh,  stay  awhile  ! 

It  was  on  me  that  thou  didst  call  ; 
Thou  has  not  seen  the  splendor  of  my  smile, 

Nor  known  that  Love  is  all  in  all. 
I  am  the  uttermost,  in  my  clear  eyes 

The  compensating  secret  lies  ; 

Beloved,  press  thy  lips  to  mine 
And  thou  hast  made  life's  crowning  glory  thine." 

Then  bending  her  deep,  tender  eyes  on  me, 

With  more  of  love  than  Love's  own  smile, 
Death  spake  :  "  Farewell  !  I  came  for  love  of  thee, 

But  thou  may'st  wait  my  kiss  awhile  ; 
O  favored  one  !  the  uttermost  is  thine 

'Tis  Love,  immortal  and  divine. 

For  when  I  claim  thee,  thou  shalt  prove 
That  Death  is  but  a  sweeter  name  for  Love." 


1 44  THE  HOL  Y  HOUR. 


THE  HOLY  HOUR. 

FAINTLY  as  fades  the  smile  from  sleeping  lips, 
The  last  of  day  wanes  in  the  quiet  West ; 

And  from  the  blue  above  me  darkness  dips, 
Like  some  wing-weary  bird  above  its  nest 

Dim  as  a  warrior's  tarnished  shield,  the  moon 
Rests  on  the  dusky  borders  of  the  sea — 

Whose  deep  voice,  like  some  weird  old  prophet's  rune, 
Through  the  still  air  is  borne  afar  to  me. 

The  low  of  herds  is  hushed  upon  the  hill, 

The  mill  has  ceased  to  murmur  by  the  stream  ; 

In  yellow  fields  the  clanging  scythe  is  still, 
And  all  the  darkling  world  is  in  a  dream. 

One  after  one,  among  the  stirless  trees, 
The  lights  come  out  along  the  village  streets, 

And  many  a  pleasant  glimpse  of  household  ease 
Lends  night,  with  all  its  stars,  a  charm  more  sweet. 


THE  HOLY  HOUR. 


145 


And  hark  !  where  in  the  gloom,  the  time-worn  tower 
Looms  gaunt  and  ghost-like  from  the  cypress  grove, 

How  tenderly  the  church-clock  tolls  the  hour — 
The  holy  hour  of  pejfect  peace  and  love  ! 

Sweet  hour  !  from  whose  cool,  crystal  urns  of  air 
The  soothing  draught  to  fevered  care  is  given, 

Whose  starry  silence,  like  a  wordless  prayer, 
Uplifts  the  dark  world  to  the  gates  of  heaven. 


I46  LOVE'S  FAITH. 


LOVE'S  FAITH. 

.    '• 

LOVE  can  wait ! 

Being"  so  patient  it  is  strong- ; 
If  in  this  world  it  wait  in  vain, 

It  surely  shall  not  suffer  long  ; 
For  in  some  other  state, 

Some  life  of  larger  scope, 
It  ultimately  shall  attain 

The  full  fruition  of  its  hope. 
This  is  love's  faith  ;  defying  fate, 

Time,  change,  neglect  and  laughter, 
It  can  wait 

For  the  Hereafter. 

II. 

Say  that  this  life  is  all  we  know, 

And  death  has  nothing  to  bestow, 
Beyond  the  grave's  duress, 

But  silence  and  forgetfulness  ; 
Then  if  I  count  the  cost, 

Seeing  love's  self  is  sacrifice — 
I  surely  have  not  lost, 

If  with  this  life  love  dies. 


LOVERS  FAITH. 

III. 

But  love's  desire, 
Being  so  patient  and  so  sure, 
Though  it  may  pass  through  tears  and  fire, 
Ay,  through  the  portals  of  the  tomb — 

Will  yet  endure, 
Till  its  own  time  shall  come ; 
Therefore,  though  never  while  we  live, 
It  may  be  mine  to  ask  or  yours  to  give — 
Though  you  may  pass  beyond  my  ken, 

And  I  be  lost 
Among  the  crowd  of  nameless  men — 

Though  both  be  tempest  tost 
To  earth's  extremest  ends  afar, 
I  know  that  we  shall  meet  again, 
Meet  and  be  one  in  perfect  love. 

But  when  and  where — 

Whether  jn  this  earth  here,  or  heaven  above, 
Or  in  some  unimagined  world  or  star, 
I  neither  know  nor  care  ; 
Early  or  late, 
Love  can  wait 


148  AMONG  THE  MOUNTAINS. 


AMONG  THE  MOUNTAINS. 

YE  lone,  majestic  Silences  that  keep 

The  hoary  secrets  of  primeval  time  ! 
Titans,  that  with  dark  frontlets  ponder  deep 

On  unconjectured  mysteries  sublime, 
Like  minds  of  lofty  mould  that  stand  alone, 

Wrapped  in  a  wilderness  of  mighty  thought — 
The  shadow  of  your  solemn  power  is  thrown 

Over  the  world  below  and  it  has  caught 
An  awed  quiet,  sombre  yet  serene, 

A  grave  repose,  a  cold,  autumnal  gleam  ; 
While  past  your  firm  feet,  shod  in  russet  green, 

With  joyous  murmur  flows  the  broad,  bright  stream, 
As  light  and  song  and  laughter  might  illume 

Some  old  cathedral's  immemorial  gloom. 


EARTH-BOUND. 


149 


EARTH-BOUND. 

SOLE  watcher  in  the  solemn  shrine  of  night, 

While  in  primeval  innocence  of  sleep 
The  world  lies  hushed,  with  folded  sense  and  sight, 

And  wind  and  wave  their  wards  of  silence  keep  ; 
I  stand  beneath  the  splendor  of  the  stars 

That  crowd  the  illimitable  courts  above, 
Like  one  who  dreams  behind  his  prison  bars 

Of  dim,  delicious  scenes  of  peace  and  love. 


The  links  of  care  that  fetter  my  worn  feet, 

The  load  of  life,  the  tyranny  of  time, 
The  vain  desire,  the  sorrow,  the  defeat, 

Have  fallen  from  me  as  in  a  trance  sublime  ; 
And  to  my  raptured  spirit*  winged  with  light, 

The  power  of  my  exultant  wish  seems  given 
To  rise  beyond  the  shadowy  realms  of  night, 

And  pierce  the  radiant  mysteries  of  heaven. 


1 5o 


EARTH-BOUND. 


Vain  thought !  afar,  where  in  the  dusky  plain 

The  hamlet  clusters  round  the  ivied  tower, 
I  hear  an  infant's  fitful  wail  of  pain, 

And  slow  and  deep  the  church-clock  toll  the  hour  ; 
And  from  the  cold  abstraction  of  the  stars, 

Those  voices  summon  me  to  earth  again, 
Bid  me  reclasp  my  chain  upon  my  scars 

And  lay  me  down  among  my  fellow  men. 

Aye,  vain  the  restless  yearning  and  the  dreams, 

Vain  the  rebellion  and  divine  despair  ! 
Drawn  ever  toward  those  beautiful  faint  gleams, 

Which  are  the  glimpses  of  some  state  more  fair, 
The  baffled  spirit  still  returns  to  earth  ; 

For  brighter  are  the  splendor  of  Love's  eyes, 
And  the  dull  embers  on  the  lowly  hearth, 

Than  all  the  silent  glory  of  the  skies. 


THE  IRONY  OF  TIME.  i «;  i 


THE  IRONY  OF  TIME. 

IF  we  could  resurrect  the  years  again, 

When  life  is  on  the  wane  ; 
If  we  could  learn  by  many  a  bitter  truth 

The  value  of  our  youth, 
Ere  the  inexorable  hand  of  Time 

Has  harvested  our  prime — 
How  we  should  drain  from  every  flower  we  meet 

The  last  drop  of  its  sweet ! 
We  scorn  the  present  hour,  and  strive  to  borrow 

Some  foretaste  of  the  morrow  ; 
The  morrow  has  its  morrow  and  the  pain 

Of  hope  deferred  again  ; 
So  waste  the  years,  till  Age  defeated  stands, 

Desolate,  with  empty  hands. 

Pilgrims  on  paths  our  fathers  trod  before, 

We  trace  their  footsteps  o'er  ; 
On  every  height,  in  every  vale  we  meet 

Signs  of  their  toiling  feet 


I  52  THE  IRONY  OF  TIME. 

Gashed  on  the  rock  and  wounded  by  the  thorn, 

Where  we  are  stung  and  torn. 
What  was  it  that  they  sought  ?  O  burning  eyes, 

Fixed  on  low  western  skies  I 
The  beckoning  shapes  that  seem  so  fair  to  you 

Wear  the  same  dazzling  hue 
That  lured  the  Vikings  through  tempestuous  seas, 

Beyond  the  Hebrides, 
Toward  purple  isles  of  peace  and  golden  lands, — 

To  die  on  freezing  strands. 

Time  has  no  precious  treasure  stored  away 

Beyond  our  grasp  to-day  ; 
Earth  has  no  secret  garden  of  delight 

Hid  from  our  aching  sight. 
Too  late  we  learn  the  humble  highway  flower 

Is  life's  best  gift  and  dower ; 
The  light  that  kindles  in  meek,  maiden  eyes 

Is  love's  divinest  guise  ; 
Too  late,  too  late  we  find  there  is  no  more, 

On  any  sea  or  shore, 
Than  those  rich  offerings  we  have  overthrown, 

Pursuing  the  unknown  ; 
Nor  any  road  by  which  we  can  attain 

Youth's  vanished  grace  again. 


THE  PAR  TING  OF  SUMMER.  j  5  3 


THE  PARTING  OF  SUMMER. 

LIKE  one  who  lingers  yet  upon  the  sands, 

Gazing  his  last  upon  the  fading  sail 
That  bears  his  friends  afar  to  other  lands, 

I  watch  the  bleak  November  daylight  fail, 
And,  weltering  in  the  pale  and  watery  skies, 
The  dim  stars  falter  forth,  the  cold  moon  rise. 

I  feel  the  silence  on  the  hill  and  plain, 

Like  that  chill  hush  which  haunts  an  empty  room 
When,  late  deserted  by  a  joyous  train, 

The  lights  die  slowly  down  and  all  is  gloom ; 
The  cricket  shrilling  in  the  darkling  wood 
Adds  but  a  drearier  sense  of  solitude. 

The  last  frail  blossom  of  the  year  is  dead, 
Scentless  and  sere,  beside  the  frozen  rill ; 

The  last  of  summer's  melodists  are  fled, 

Their  nests  are  tenantless,  their  songs  are  still, 

And,  like  the  echo  of  a  faint  farewell, 

I  hear  the  shuddering  night-wind  sink  and  swell. 


j  5  4  ME  TEMPS  YCHOSIS. 


METEMPSYCHOSIS. 

LOVE,  tell  me  in  what  other  clime 
We  met  and  loved  and  passed  away  ; 

For  surely  in  the  olden  time 

We  kissed  as  we  have  kissed  to-day. 

I  have  dim  memories  of  a  night — 
A  night  all  summer  perfume,  when 

We  passed  an  hour  of  pure  delight 
And  parting,  meant  to  meet  again. 

'Twas  in  a  rude  and  warlike  age 

Of  lance  and  helm  and  steel-mailed  glove, 
When  more  with  joy  than  martial  rage, 

Men  died  to  win  a  lady's  love. 

I  loved  thee  then,  not  less  than  now  ; 

We  meet  to-day  as  then  we  met ; 
The  same  sweet  light  on  lip  and  brow — 

The  look  of  love,  is  lingering  yet 


ME  TEMPS  YCHOSIS.  1 5  5 

We've  slept  since  then,  profound  and  sweet, 

The  dreamless  slumber  of  decay  ; 
Nor  marked  how  time  with  tireless  feet 

Bore  years  and  centuries  away. 

And  while  we  slept  the  sword  and  pen 

Upturned  the  feudal  world  above, 
Changed  customs,  changed  the  race  of  men, 

Changed  all,  except  ourselves  and  love. 

But  of  this  change  we  heeded  nought 
Save  of  a  yearning,  vague,  profound  ; 

And  restless  through  the  world  we  sought 
Until  each  other's  arms  we  found. 

And  ere  long  we  shall  part,  to  take 

Our  rest  with  death  and  silence.     When 

After  dim  centuries  we  wake, 

Doubt  not  we  meet  and  love  again. 


156  SOATG. 


DUET. 

HE.  , 

NAY,  hold  me  not — I  must  be  going  ; 

Unwind  thine  arms  and  set  me  free  ! 
The  moments  fly — I  must  be  doing 

Braver  deeds  than  kissing  thee. 

SHE. 

Have  then  thy  will — I  would  not  bind  thee, 
Though  it  were  death  to  set  thee  free. 

Ah  me  !  dost  think  that  thou  wilt  find  thee 
A  sweeter  fate  than  kissing  me  ? 


INSINCERITY. 


J57 


INSINCERITY. 

FAINT  in  the  face  of  some  controlling  fear — 
A  tyrant  shadow  with  cold,  sneering-  eyes, 

Which  at  an  honest  laugh  would  disappear — 
We  clothe  ourselves  in  plausible  disguise 
And  wrong  our  nature  with  laborious  lies. 

Fear  of  the  scorn  which  rightly  understood, 
Is  honor  paid  to  genius  unaware  ; 

Fear  of  the  venomed  fangs  of  that  vile  brood 
Who  fawn  on  Fortune  while  the  skies  are  fair, 
And  bark  about  the  footsteps  of  Despair  : 

Fear  to  be  loyal  to  ourselves  through  all, 
Unshaken,  unashamed  in  all  men's  sight  ; 

Fear  like  the  Apostle's  in  the  High  Priest's  hall, 
Who,  shrinking  from  the  martyr's  glorious  right, 
Disowned  the  Master  and  forswore  him  quite  : 


1 5  8  JNSINCER2  TY. 

Fear  to  be  merely  human,  simply  man — 
Richer  than  kings  in  that  plain  dignity — 

Grandly  imperfect,  after  God's  own  plan  ; 
Finding  in  our  own  faults  full  charity 
And  general  pardon  for  humanity. 

Ah,  no,  we  lack  the  courage  to  be  real  ; 
Each  in  his  various  folly  toils  and  tries 

To  mould  his  nature  to  some  false  ideal, 
And  walks  a-tiptoe  to  increase  his  size, 
Decked  out  in  borrowed  plumage,  jackdaw- wise. 

Who  dare  say  :  I  have  neither  gold  nor  lands, 
High  heritage  of  ancient  blood  or  name  ; 

Labor  hath  set  its  seal  upon  my  hands  ; 
Son  of  the  sons  of  toil  unknown  to  fame 
I  am,  and  thereunto  I  take  no  shame  ? 


Who  dare  say  to  the  world's  conflicting  creeds  : 
Solace  I  sought  in  ye  and  was  denied ; 

I  leaned  on  ye  and  found  ye  hollow  reeds  ; 
Old,  dying  dungeoners  of  truth  !  ye  hide 
The  face  of  God  with  dust  of  human  pride  ? 


INSINCERITY.  159 

Alas  how  few  !  yet  dared  we  rise  above 
The  common  curse  of  insincerity, 

Frank,  just  and  fearless,  strong  in  truth  and  love, 
A  law  unto  ourselves,  that  were  to  be 
First  of  the  sons  of  time,  wise,  great  and  free. 


160  BITTER-SWEET. 


BITTER-SWEET. 

MY  heart  has  made  a  slave  of  me 

By  love's  device  and  friendship's  smile  ; 

I  doubt  the  day,  I  dread  the  night, 

I  quake  at  every  sound  and  sight — 

So  lost  am  I — ah,  woe  the  while  ! 

I  pine  not  for  my  liberty. 

Through  frost  and  heat,  through  damp  and  dust, 

I  tread  one  steep  and  stony  course  ; 

Or  if  I  turn  and  ease  my  load 

To  pluck  some  blossom  by  the  road, 

Swift  fall  the  lashes  of  remorse  ; 

My  heart  permits  no  lapse  of  trust. 

My  heart  has  lotted  me  to  bear 
The  weight  of  many  destinies  ; 
Fast-linked  to  other  lives,  I  feel 
The  pulses  of  their  woe  and  weal, 
And  countless  watchful  sympathies 
Make  ray  existence  one  long  care. 


BITTER-S  WEE  T.  1 5  j 

O  nights  of  cold,  prophetic  fears  ! 

0  days  of  ripened  misery  ! 
Your  bitterness  I  have  not  known 
For  pangs  or  perils  of  my  own  ; 
My  heart  has  laid  your  load  on  me, 
And  love  has  cankered  all  my  years. 

Yet  fortune  has  no  gift  for  me 

That  I  would  barter  for  these  pains ; 

1  claim  no  ease,  I  ask  no  rest, 
But  count  myself  supremely  blest 
If  I  may  pass  my  days  in  chains, 
And  die  in  this  dear  slavery. 


1 6  2  THE  ELDORADO. 


THE  ELDORADO. 

TIME  was  when  tales  of  gold  lands  in  the  West, 
And  fountains  quelling  death  forevermore, 

Launched  Hope's  frail  shallop  on  an  idle  quest 

Through  strange  seas  toward  this  bleak,  unbeaconed 
shore. 

The  charm  has  fled  before  the  living  stream 

That  floods  each  erewhile  trackless  hill  and  plain  ; 

Yet  since  the  heart  of  man  must  have  its  dream, 
We  turn  our  eyes  upon  the  east  again. 

There  lies  the  Eldorado — storied  land 

Of  gold-domed  cities  gleaming  from  afar  ; 

There  Founts  of  Youth  gush  from  the  jewelled  sand, 
And  Song  woos  Love  beneath  the  evening  star. 

O  wondrous  world  that  I  have  never  seen  ! 

And  deem  too  sadly  I  shall  never  see— 
My  life  one  long  impassioned  wish  has  been 

To  press  thy  sacred  shores  with  reverent  knee  ! 


THE  ELDORADO.  } 

O  Rome  !  to  thread  thy  dim  old  ways  and  stand 
Where  stood  the  mighty  ones  of  other  days, 

With  palace,  temple,  forum  on  each  hand, 
And  fill  my  soul  with  one  long,  thirsty  gaze  ! 

To  be  within  the  Coliseum's  wall, 

A  still  hour  when  the  moon's  autumnal  beams 
Through  crumbled  arch  and  rift  of  ruin  fall, 

Forgetting  my  poor  self  in  solemn  dreams  ! 

Then  would  I  resurrect  the  buried  years  ; 

The  splendid  past  should  walk  before  my  gaze  ; 
The  mighty  dead  should  murmur  in  my  ears, 

And  1  should  be  a  Roman  of  old  days. 

"Look  thou  on  queenly  Naples  and  then  die  !  " 

I  deem  it  not  so  dear  a  price  to  pay, 
If  with  such  beauty  in  the  heart  and  eye, 

I  look  my  last  on  earth  and  swoon  away. 

Would  that  such  fate  were  mine  !     Yet  know  I  not 

If  ever  human  heart  drew  happiness 
From  hope  fulfilled.     Is  it  a  fairer  lot 

To  long  eternally  and  not  possess  ? 


THE  KING. 


THE  KING. 

AN  ermined  spectre  on  a  shaking  throne, 

That  sits  with  stony  eyes,  unmoved  and  cold,  , 

While  round  about  the  people  curse  and  groan  ; 

An    old,   wan,    withered    shape,    brow-bound    with 
gold- 
Long  live  the  king  ! 

Dark  relic  of  the  blind,  benighted  years, 
Last  of  a  race  defiled  by  shame  and  crime 

And  stained  with  centuries  of  blood  and  tears, 

Abhorred  in  the  searching  eye  of  time. — 

Long  live  the  king  ! 

Thine  is  the  bitter  heritage  of  hate  ; 

Thy  fathers'  heavy  deeds  are  on  thy  head  ; 
They  load  thee  down  as  with  a  leaden  weight, 

They  cry  upon  thee  from  the  nameless  dead. 
Long  live  the  king  ! 


THE  KING.  165 

They  haunt  thy  fevered  couch  in  haggard  dreams, 
They  mock  thy  greatness  with  a  secret  fear  ; 

They  write  upon  the  wall  in  fiery  gleams — 

"Belshazzar,  thou  art  weighed,  thy  doom  is  near  !  '' 
Long  live  the  king  ! 

In  thee  the  long,  ancestral  sin  shall  cease  ; 

What  place  hast  thou  among  the  sons  of  men  ? 
Pass  on  and  give  the  warring  nations  peace ; 

The  like  of  thee  shall  not  be  seen  again. 
Long  live  the  king  ! 

Pass  on,  thou  ancient,  immemorial  lie  ! 

Thy  power  is  broken  in  thy  feeble  hands  ; 
Behold  !  the  long  night  lifts  along  the  sky, 

The  new  day  rises  fair  in  many  lands. 
Long  live  the  king  ! 

And  lo  !  with  clash  of  brass  and  clang  of  drums, 
And  thunder  of  the  world's  advancing  tread, 

The  heir  of  time,  thy  strong  successor  comes 
To  pluck  the  crown  from  thy  dishonored  head. 
Long  live  the  king  ! 


166  THE  KING. 

Man !  meant  of  God  to  be  sole  king  of  men, 

Whose  birthright  is  the  broad,  unbarriered  earth, 

Whose  chariot  is  the  plough,  whose  sword  the  pen, 
Whose  crown  the  majesty  of  truth  and  worth. 
Long  live  the  king  1 

Ay,  man  !  born  thrall  to  gold  and  place  and  pride, 
Back-bent  with  burdens,  beaten  with  sharp  rods, 

Self-sold  to  vice  and  fear,  creed-crucified, 

Patient  of  power  and  prostrate  to  false  gods — 
Long  live  the  king  ! 

Rerisen  from  world-old  darkness  and  despair, 

Fire-purified,  baptized  in  agony  ; 
Behold  !  this  is  indeed  the  king  and  heir, 

Wise,  great  and  good,  well  worthy  to  be  free  ! 
Long  live  the  king  ! 


CLOUDLAND. 


CLOUD  LAND. 

SOMEWHERE,  the  legends  say,  there  lies  a  land 
Older  than  silent  Egypt,  whose  dim  coast 

No  human  foot  has  trod,  no  eye  has  scanned  ; 
Where  never  mariner  was  tempest-tossed, 

Nor  pilgrim  fared  along  the  lonely  strand ; 

And  where  in  brimming  cisterns  hyaline, 
Flashes  the  Fountain  of  Eternal  Youth, 

Whereof  who  drinks  shall  know  not  any  sign 
Of  fading  cheek  or  palsy-parched  mouth, 

Or  age's  long,  slow  languor  and  decline. 

Some  say  beyond  the  sunset's  latest  ray, 
Far  down  the  ocean's  azure  brink  it  lies ; 

And  ofttimes  I  have  seen,  at  close  of  day, 
Strange  semblances  reflected  in  the  skies, 

In  cloudy  pageant  soon  dissolved  away — 


1 68  CLOUDLAND. 

Domes,  temples,  palaces,  and  misty  gleams 
Of  shapes  disclosed  behind  thin    purple  veils, 

Vistas  of  hills  and  plains  and  winding  streams, 
Dusk  forest  solitudes  and  pastoral  dales ; 

Sweet  haunts  of  quietness  and  pleasant  dreams. 

Surely  the  old  belief  was  not  all  vain  ! 

There  must  be  ultimate,  divine  repose, 
And  love  that  dieth  not  and  end  of  pain  ; 

But  none  have  found  beyond  the  twilight's  close 
The  hidden  highway  to  that  dim  domain. 

Yet  the  relentless  turmoil  and  unrest, 

The  inborn,  feverous  craving  and  the  strife. 

The  winged  spirit,  prisoned  and  oppressed, 
Urge  us  still  onward  toward  the  ideal  life, — 

Onward  forever  in  untiring  quest. 


M19199G 


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